Star Trek UFO' hovering above lake convinces staunch sceptic aliens DO exist

A MINDBOGGLING picture has emerged of a “Star Trek Enterprise-like UFO” seemingly hovering above a lake.

NEWPORT BEACH NONPROFIT DEFENDS ITS UFO RESEARCH AGAINST SKEPTICS

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Policeman breaks 70-year silence about flying saucer encounter in 1947

Rob Waugh for Metro.co.uk

A policeman has broken his silence about an encounter with a flying saucer where he claims he could ‘clearly see’ aliens in the cockpit – after 70 years of silence.

Neil John McIntyre worked as a policeman in Shepparton, northern Victoria, Australia – but says he had his close encounter aged 12, in 1947, at around the same time as the Roswell incident.

He and his friend Max – now deceased – both saw the aliens for ‘four or five minutes’, he told local paper the Shepparton News – but swore not to speak of it, as Max had a promising boxing career and didn’t want to be associated with UFOs.

He’s even drawn chilling pictures of the strange beings he saw inside the craft, which he claims was hovering near a lamppost, ‘sucking power’ out of it.

McIntyre told local newspaper Shepparton News, ‘It was a Sunday, and it was a cold, dark night.

‘It was a bit smaller than a Melbourne tram, it was similar to flying saucers seen around the world.

‘You could clearly see two guys (in the craft) that we called aliens in the front cockpit.’’

‘Their hands were not in my view, but I got the impression they were controlling some sort of instrument It might have been extracting power from the lamp post.’’

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Angel UFO Appears over Brooklyn, NY Church, But Lets Dig Deeper. Jan 2016, Video, UFO Sighting News.

Date of sighting: Jan 2017
Location of sighting: Brooklyn, New York, USA

I see this a lot, a reflection off a window is not seen by the person filming, but is caught by the camera, because the digital eye is near perfect and misses less. It happens most often in airplanes where the interior is dark and the LEDs are turned on, or from a tall building where the lights behind the person actually reflect off the inside of the window and get caught on camera. This is a valuable lesson from UFO Planet of Youtube, and great presentation so that people can avoid this mistake in the future. 
Scott C. Waring

Eyewitness states: 

"This was taken from a bus that was moving very slowly during a tour of Brooklyn, NY. I did not have my flash on my iPhone when I took the photos. Also, I only took a photo of this because I knew what the building was but was not mentioned by the tour guide so there would probably not be others taking photos." 

"I saw the light after the fact when I was looking at my photos. If anyone has the knowledge to judge if this is a reflection, I would welcome that. I took many photos from the bus that day and that particular image did not appear in any of others."

SaveSave

UFO over the Kampinos Forest in Poland Jan 1, 2017, VIDEO, UFO Sighting News.

Date of sighting: Jan 1, 2017
Location of sighting: Kampinos Forest, Warsaw, Poland

This UFO in just under two minutes moves across the sky becoming smaller in the distance. The UFO is mimicking the suns coloration in order to fool those who might see the craft. Remember, UFOs will attempt to blend into the environment any way they can. Any effort by them would create doubt about it being a UFO in the mind of a human, but as we know, the sun doesn't travel that far that fast. It it were the sun, it would take over an hour to make it that far. 
Scott C. Waring

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Flying Saucers to Mind Control: 22 Declassified Military & CIA Secrets

Credit: U.S. Air Force

INTRO: A secret history

Government and military secrets can range from terrifying to amusing to downright absurd, but most are nothing short of intriguing. From a secret U.S. Air Force project to build a supersonic flying saucer to a now-famous World War II-era research program that produced the first atomic bombs to a plan to train domesticated cats to spy on the Soviet Union, here are 22 declassified military and CIA secrets.

Credit: National Archives

1. Project 1794

In late 2012, the U.S. Air Force declassified a trove of documents, including records of a secret program to build a flying saucer-type aircraft designed to shoot down Soviet bombers. The ambitious program, called Project 1794, was initiated in the 1950s, and a team of engineers was tasked with building a disc-shape vehicle capable of traveling at supersonic speeds at high altitudes.

The declassified documents reveal plans for the plane to reach a top speed of Mach 4 (four times the speed of sound), and reach an altitude of 100,000 feet (30,480 meters). The project's estimated cost was more than $3 million, which in today's dollars would be more than $26 million.

Project 1794 was canceled in December 1961 after tests suggested the flying saucer design was aerodynamically unstable and would likely be uncontrollable at high speeds (let alone supersonic speeds).

Credit: Frank J. Leskovitz

2.  Project Iceworm

In the 1960s, the U.S. Army embarked on a secret mission to build a series of mobile nuclear missile launch sites under the Greenland ice sheet. The objective was to house medium-range missiles close enough to strike targets within the Soviet Union.

The program was codenamed Project Iceworm, but to test its feasibility, the Army launched a cover research project called "Camp Century" in 1960. Under this guise, engineers built a network of underground buildings and tunnels, including living quarters, a kitchen, a recreation hall, infirmary, laboratories, supply rooms, a communications center and a nuclear power plant.

The base, which was kept secret from the Danish government, operated for seven years. The program was canceled in 1966 after shifting ice created unstable conditions. Today, the crushed remains of Project Iceworm are buried beneath Arctic snow.

Credit: RealCG Animation Studio | Shutterstock

3. Project MK-ULTRA

During the Cold War, the CIA initiated Project MK-ULTRA, a secret and illegal human research program to investigate potential mind-control systems. The program's operators examined the effects of hypnosis, biological agents and drugs, such as LSD and barbiturates, on human subjects. Some historians suggest the program was designed to develop a mind-control system that could be used to "program" the brains of potential assassins. [The 10 Craziest Military Experiments]

In 1973, then-CIA director Richard Helms ordered that all documents from Project MK-ULTRA be destroyed, but a formal investigation into the program was launched several years later. The project became the basis for several movies, such as "The Manchurian Candidate" and "The Men Who Stare at Goats."

Credit: Public domain

4. Area 51

Almost no other site has garnered as much attention from conspiracy theorists and UFO-enthusiasts as Area 51, a remote desert tract near Groom Lake in Nevada, roughly 83 miles (134 kilometers) northwest of Las Vegas. The intense secrecy surrounding the base sparked peoples' imaginations, and Area 51 was commonly linked to paranormal activities, including pervasive theories that suggested Area 51 hid aliens and UFOs.

In July 2013, declassified documents from the CIA acknowledged the existence of Area 51 for the first time, and confirmed that the top-secret site was used to test a variety of spy planes, including the well-known U-2 reconnaissance aircraft.

While Area 51, which operates as a detachment of Edwards Air Force Base in neighboring California, has never been declared a covert base, the research and activities conducted there were some of the nation's most closely guarded secrets.

Credit: Fer Gregory | Shutterstock

5. Project Grudge

While Area 51 was not a top-secret base designed to study extraterrestrials, the U.S. Air Force did study the existence of UFOs. Project Grudge was a short-lived program launched in 1949 to study unidentified flying objects. The mission followed an earlier program, known as Project Sign, which published a report in early 1949 stating that while some UFOs seemed to be actual aircraft, there was not enough data to determine their origins. [Top 10 States for UFO Sightings]

Critics of Project Grudge said the program solely set out to debunk UFO reports, and very little actual research was conducted. In his book on the topic, Edward J. Ruppelt, Air Force Captain and director of Project Grudge, wrote: "[I]t doesn't take a great deal of study of the old UFO files to see that standard intelligence procedures were not being followed by Project Grudge. Everything was being evaluated on the premise that UFOs couldn't exist. No matter what you see or hear, don't believe it."

Credit: NASA

6. Operation Paperclip

In September 1946, President Harry Truman authorized a program called Operation Paperclip, which aimed to lure scientists from Nazi Germany to the United States following World War II. Officials at the Office of Strategic Services (the predecessor to the CIA) recruited German scientists to America to aid the country's postwar efforts, which would also ensure that valuable scientific knowledge would not end up in the hands of the Soviet Union or the divided East and West Germany.

Operation Paperclip's most famous recruit was rocket scientist Wernher von Braun, who would go on to mastermind NASA's Apollo moon missions.

Credit: Warren K. Leffler, Library of Congress

7.Operation Northwoods

The tense relationship between the United States and Cuba during the Cold War led the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to hatch a slew of bizarre schemes aimed at taking down the Castro regime. While the goal of most of these covert operations (such as Operation Mongoose) was to assassinate Fidel Castro himself, other plans aimed to incite an all-out war between the U.S. and Cuba, experts have said. 

In 1998, the National Security Archive (NSA) — a non-governmental organization that publishes information made available through the Freedom of Information Act — posted declassified documents related to Operation Northwoods. The scheme, dreamed up in 1962 by the Joint Chiefs of Staff (uniformed members of the U.S. Department of Defense who advise the president and others), involved committing acts of violence against U.S. and Cuban civilians and then blaming those acts on the Cuban government, according to the NSA documents. These acts, which included faked terrorist attacks in U.S. cities, the hijacking of planes and the sinking of boats full of Cuban émigrés en route to the U.S., would then be used to justify a war with Cuba, according to the documents.

The Kennedy administration recognized the folly of Operation Northwoods and rejected it, according to news reports.µ

Credit: Jack Aeby

8. Manhattan Project

One of the most well-known secret research programs is the Manhattan Project, which eventually produced the world's first atomic bombs. The project began in 1939, and was cloaked in secrecy as physicists investigated the potential power of atomic weapons. From 1942 to 1946, Major General Leslie Groves of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers led the Manhattan Project.

The first nuclear bomb was detonated at 5:30 a.m. on July 16, 1945, during the so-called Trinity test at the Alamogordo Air Base, 120 miles (193 km) south of Albuquerque, N.M. The explosion created a mushroom cloud that stretched 40,000 feet (12,200 m), and the bomb's explosive power was equivalent to more than 15,000 tons of TNT.

A month after the Trinity test, two atomic bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in Japan in the waning stages of World War II. To date, the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki remain the only uses of nuclear weapons in war.

Credit: National Archives and Records Administration

9. Operation Gladio

During the Cold War, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, or NATO, developed a classified plan for keeping Europe "safe" in the event of a Soviet invasion. The plan, known as Operation Gladio, called for the formation of secret armies or "stay-behind" organizations in many NATO countries, including Italy, Belgium and France, according to declassified documents.

The mission of the secret armies was simple: Prepare for a potential communist takeover and lead an armed resistance should such a takeover occur. In some countries, "preparing" for Soviet invasion included espionage and the hoarding of ammunitions.

And these clandestine armies weren't just kept secret from the Soviet Union. High-ranking government officials in countries where the military forces operated were sometimes not aware of the armies' existence. Italian Prime Minister at the time, the late Giulio Andreotti divulged information about Italy's secret Cold War army (known as Gladio) in 1990, becoming the first leader of a NATO country to publicly acknowledge one of these forces. Declassified documents related to NATO's stay-behind armies are accessible via The Black Vault, a website that makes declassified documents available to the public.

Credit: Public Domain

10. My Lai Massacre

In March 1968, American soldiers murdered hundreds of unarmed civilians in the South Vietnamese hamlet of My Lai, according to accounts of the massacre that describe harrowing killings of at least 300 women, children and elderly people.

Army officials managed to cover up the massacre for a year before an investigative journalist with the Associated Press (AP) brought the atrocity to the attention of the American people in November 1969. In light of news reports, an official inquiry was made into the events at My Lai and was concluded in March 1970. The inquiry resulted in criminal charges against 14 U.S. Army officers, all but one of whom were acquitted for their crimes. Declassified documents associated with the inquiry are available from the Library of Congress.

In the wake of the My Lai massacre, the Pentagon established a task force known as the Vietnam War Crimes Working Group, which investigated incidents similar to the killings at My Lai. That group compiled more than 9,000 pages of documents detailing crimes by U.S. troops during the Vietnam War, many of which were declassified during the 1990s. These and other declassified documents regarding Vietnam War crimes can be accessed through the National Archives.

Credit: M. Cornelius/Shutterstock.com

11. Operation Washtub

Secret armies also existed in the United States during the Cold War. In 2014, declassified documents from the U.S. Air Force and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) revealed a plan dreamed up in 1950 for a "covert intelligence and evasion and escape operation in Alaska."

Nicknamed "Operation Washtub," the plan called for the training of ordinary Alaskans in coding, decoding and other espionage techniques so that they could spy on the enemy in the event of a Soviet invasion of Alaska. While such an invasion never occurred, a total of 89 "agents" were trained for this purpose, according to news reports. 

Credit: Central Intelligence Agency

12. Oleg Penkovsky

Oleg Penkovsky was a high-ranking Soviet military intelligence officer who worked as a spy for the United States and Great Britain during the Cold War. Best known for his role in the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962, Penkovsky supplied the U.S. government with valuable details about the capabilities of Soviet missiles that had been installed in Cuba.

The spy was eventually sniffed out by his fellow Soviet intelligence officers, charged with treason and executed in 1963. However, there are some people who believe that Penkovsky was just a decoy who may have relayed false information about Soviet arms capabilities to U.S. intelligence agents. Some point to declassified documents outlining the intelligence provided by Penkovsky as proof that the spy's loyalty was really to the Soviet Union.

Credit: Central Intelligence Agency

13. Acoustic Kitty

A report from 1967 shows that the CIA spent millions of dollars in an attempt to train domesticated cats to spy on the Soviet Union. Yes, you read that correctly. Nicknamed Acoustic Kitty, the program involved implanting electronic spying equipment into live cats and then training them to "eavesdrop" on unsuspecting Cold War rivals.

If you don't believe this ridiculous program existed, you can read more about it in this memorandum published by the National Security Archive.

Credit: U.S. Air Force

14. Greenland's Lost Bomb

In 1968, a U.S. B-52 bomber carrying four hydrogen bombs on a routine (but secret) mission crashed near Thule Air Base in Greenland. In the aftermath of the crash, American and Danish officials launched a project to clean up radioactive debris and collect the scattered pieces of the nuclear bombs. However, for years later, news reports out of Denmark and the U.S. questioned whether all four bombs had really been located. [Photos: Top-Secret, Cold War-Era Military Base in Greenland]

In 2008, the BBC published an article based on declassified documents regarding the Thule accident, asserting that one of the four hydrogen bombs was never recovered from the crash site. This claim by a respected publication led the Danish prime minister to request a new investigation of the declassified documents used for the BBC report. That investigation, led by Danish scholar Svend Aage Christensen, found that the BBC's report was not based on any new declassified information (it drew from information that had previously been declassified) and that all four weapons had, in fact, been destroyed during the crash in 1968, according to the National Security Archive.

Credit: U.S. Army

15. Project Horizon

Before the civilian space organization NASA put the first astronaut on the moon in 1969, at least two U.S. military organizations drew up plans for establishing strategic lunar military outposts. In 1959, the U.S. Army drew up a proposal for a "manned military" base on the moon. That proposal, which was submitted by the Army's chief of research and development, was dubbed Project Horizon and would "develop and protect potential United States interest on the moon," according to declassified documents.

Another program, this one developed by the U.S. Air Force, sought to establish a "Lunar Based Earth Bombardment System" that met specific military requirements. Another Air Force study, this one submitted in 1959, involved detonating a nuclear weapon on the moon. The study was spearheaded by Leonard Reiffel, then a physicist at the Illinois Institute of Technology, and also included contributions from the astrophysicist Carl Sagan. In a 2010 interview with The New York Times, Reifell said that the "foremost intent [of the nuclear detonation] was to impress the world with the prowess of the United States."

Credit: Creative Commons license

16. Mapimi Silent Zone

A declassified document could help clear up some urban legends at one of Mexico's most bizarre tourist traps. The so-called Mapimí Silent Zone is a small stretch of desert in Durango, Mexico, where, according to local legend, radio waves cannot be transmitted. Often compared to the Bermuda Triangle, Mapimí is frequented by tourists looking for a paranormal adventure.

But the real reason that Mapimí is an interesting location has nothing to do with aliens or paranormal energy — it has to do with a big mistake by the U.S. Air Force. In 1970, an ATHENA V-123-D rocket carrying two small vials of cobalt 57 (a radioactive isotope that is sometimes used in salted bombs) crashed in the Durango desert. The rocket was supposed to land in New Mexico, according to documents declassified in 2013. Local legends may have sprung up as a result of this Air Force flop.

Credit: U.S. Navy

17. Iran Flight 655

In 1988, a U.S. warship in the Persian Gulf shot down an Iranian civilian aircraft en route to Dubai, killing all 290 passengers on board. Navy personnel incorrectly identified the civilian plane as an Iranian fighter jet before launching the missile that took down the flight, according to declassified documents.

The U.S. reached a settlement with Iran in 1996 in which it agreed to pay $61.8 million to compensate families of the Iranian victims. However, the U.S. government never issued an apology. The Pentagon conducted a now-declassified official investigation into the incident in 1988 and did not find fault with the naval officers who brought down Flight 655.

However, in the wake of the investigation by the Department of Defense, several journalists pointed out discrepancies between the official report and later accounts of what occurred. For example, the flight was originally said to have deviated from its standard route, but this was later found to be false. The report also states that the warship was operating in international waters at the time of the missile launch, when it was in fact operating in Iranian territorial waters.

Credit: CIA

18. Kidnapping of the Lunik

Sometimes, declassified documents read like a scene out of a James Bond film. That's the case with this document, titled "The Kidnapping of the Lunik." It tells the story of a CIA-led mission to "borrow" a Soviet lunar satellite for just one night.

The so-called kidnapping occurred in the early 1960s, at the height of the U.S.-Soviet space race. To make it clear that they were winning this race, the Soviets launched a multinational exhibition of their Lunik satellite, the first spacecraft to reach the vicinity of the Earth's moon. [Top 10 Soviet and Russian Space Missions]

One night, undercover CIA agents convinced the truck driver who transported the satellite from city to city to get some rest at a nearby hotel and leave the satellite in their care, the documents revealed. They then "borrowed" the Soviet orbiter — taking it apart and photographing its components before putting it back on the truck. There was no indication that the Soviets knew what had happened that fateful night, according to the declassified documents.

Credit: U.S. Navy

19. USS Liberty

In 1967, in the midst of the Six-Day War (a conflict between Israel and its neighboring Arab states), Israeli aircraft attacked the USS Liberty, a ship gathering intelligence for the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA). Thirty-four Americans were killed in the attack and 171 more were injured. But was the attack intentional?

Many people believe that the Israeli government meant to open fire on the so-called "spy ship" to prevent it from intercepting sensitive information about upcoming battles, according to the declassified NSA report. But official investigations by both U.S. and Israeli agencies concluded that the attack was not deliberate, with pilots confirming that they believed the USS Liberty to be an enemy ship. This declassified NSA report explains the agency's position on the contentious issue. 

Credit: SF photo | Shutterstock.com

20. FBI Surveillance Planes

In 2015, the AP broke the news of an FBI surveillance program that uses small aircraft to spy on suspects on the ground. The planes carry video and cellphone surveillance technology and are registered to fictitious companies. When the AP released its report in June 2015, the planes had been observed above more than 30 cities in 11 U.S. states in a 30-day period.

While the FBI told the AP that its aerial surveillance program is not a secret, details about what information the planes collect is highly censored in publicly available documents, according to the AP. The report also states that the FBI operates these planes without judicial approval. One document, obtained by the National Security Archive, shows the names and addresses of the fictitious companies that operate the planes. NSA expert and historian Matthew M. Aid also created a list of the aircraft that are used in this FBI "air force."

Credit: Public Domain

21. Operation Crossroads

In July 2016, the National Security Archive posted declassified documents, films and photographs that show U.S. tests of atomic bombs in the Bikini Atoll in 1946. Dubbed Operation Crossroads, the tests marked the first atomic explosions since the bombings of Japan during World War II in August 1945. [In Photos: Dive to USS Independence Wreck]

While much is publicly known about the tests, the declassified documents shed new light on how the tests affected people of Bikini Atoll, who were forced to relocate. They also offer a view of the objections raised by scientists and military officials before the bombings, as well as the rationale behind the decision to carry out the tests despite these objections.

Credit: Central Intelligence Agency

22. Zhivago

During the Cold War, the CIA played a role in distributing the book "Doctor Zhivago" throughout the Soviet Union. The book by Russian writer Boris Pasternak was banned by the Soviets, according to a Washington Post article, because it displayed an open-minded view of the Bolshevik Revolution and its protagonist, a doctor-poet, was staunchly individualistic.

Seeing the book's potential as a propaganda tool, the CIA worked with its allies in Dutch Intelligence to deliver about 1,000 copies of the book into Soviet hands, according to documents declassified in 2014. The books were distributed to visiting Soviets at the World's Fair in Brussels in 1958 with help from the Vatican, according to the National Security Archive.

Bound in unmarked blue linen and wrapped in brown paper, the books made their way into the Soviet Union, where the CIA hoped they would stir up anti-communist sentiment among disgruntled citizens. The CIA also smuggled other banned books into the Soviet Union, including James Joyce's "A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man" and Vladimir Nabokov's "Pnin."

Surprise! Monster Burst of Radio Waves Arose in Tiny Galaxy

For the first time, scientists have directly traced an incredibly intense, blindingly bright burst of radio waves — known as an FRB — back to its home galaxy. Surprisingly, this impressive cosmic radio flasher has somewhat humble origins, according to three new studies detailing the findings. 

FRB stands for "fast radio burst." These flickers of light were just discovered in 2007, and although they last for just a fraction of a second, they release more energy than our entire sun will radiate in 10,000 years. Eighteen FRBs have been detected, but scientists estimate that one of these bursts occurs somewhere in the sky about once every 10 seconds. 

What cosmic event could release such an intense burst of radio waves? That's still a mystery, but narrowing down the precise location of one of these radio blasts is a big step toward cracking the case. [8 Baffling Astronomy Mysteries]

The new study shows that the burst, known as FRB 121102, originated about 3 billion light-years away from Earth, from inside a dwarf galaxy — a collection of stars much smaller than large galaxies like the Milky Way. 

A visible-light image of the host galaxy of FRB 121102.

Credit: Gemini Observatory/AURA/NSF/NRC

A surprising source

The fact that FRB 121102 originated from a dwarf galaxy was a bit unexpected, said Cees Bassa, an astronomer at the Netherlands Institute for Radio Astronomy (ASTRON) and a co-author of one of the three new studies.

"We were not sure what to expect, but I think the whole team was surprised to see that our exotic source is hosted by a very puny and faint galaxy," Bassa said in a statement from the Max Planck Institute for Radio Astronomy in Bonn, Germany (where some of the co-authors are based). 

The surprising finding could provide clues about the source of these radio bursts.

"One would generally expect most FRBs to come from large galaxies which have the largest numbers of stars and neutron stars," study co-author Shriharsh Tendulkar said in a statement from McGill University in Montreal, where he is a postdoctoral researcher. "This dwarf galaxy has fewer stars but is forming stars at a high rate, which may suggest that FRBs are linked to young neutron stars." (Neutron stars are dense objects that form when a star explodes and its remaining material collapses on itself.)

An artist's impression of the Gemini telescope detecting the signal of a fast radio burst in a distant dwarf galaxy.

Credit: Copyright Danielle Futselaar (www.artsource.nl)

Difficult subjects

Because FRBs appear and then disappear in the night sky very quickly, they are incredibly difficult to detect and study. A telescope must already be looking at the region of the sky where the flash appears in order to see it, and there's no time to alert other telescopes and have them turn their eyes toward the source. That makes it extremely difficult to refine the location and distance of these flashes. (A study released earlier this year claimed to have traced an FRB back to its source galaxy, but doubt was later thrown on that finding. In addition, that study used an indirect method to trace the FRB's origin, whereas the studies of FRB 121102 trace its location directly.)

But FRB 121102 is unique because it's a repeater. This radio burst was first discovered in November 2012 by astronomers using the Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico, and was seen by that telescope again in 2014. In 2016, it was caught flashing nine times, during a dedicated study using the Very Large Array (VLA) in New Mexico. Additional observations of the burst were also taken with telescopes belonging to the European VLBI Network, including the 100-meter (330 feet) Effelsberg radio telescope in Germany.

Those observations helped researchers narrow down the source of this radio flasher. With the 8-meter (26 feet) Gemini North telescope in Hawaii, the researchers then showed that the FRB was coming from a dwarf galaxy located about 3 billion light-years away.

"Before we knew the distance to any FRBs, several proposed explanations for their origins said they could be coming from within or near our own Milky Way galaxy," Tendulkar said in a statement from the National Radio Astronomy Observatory. "We now have ruled out those explanations, at least for this FRB." 

The repeated appearance of FRB 121102 could also offer clues to its origin: If the flashes are caused by a neutron star, they might be expected to occur regularly. Spinning neutron stars that radiate beams of light are known as pulsars, and they appear to flicker on and off because of a lighthouse effect: The beam sweeps across Earth as the pulsar spins, moving in and out of view with a regular frequency. Astronomers are now studying FRB 121102 with radio, optical, X-ray and gamma-ray telescopes to search for clues. 

Tendulkar said two other classes of extreme events are also known to occur frequently in dwarf galaxies: long-duration gamma-ray bursts, or very bright flashes of high-energy light, and superluminous supernovas, or very bright exploding stars. 

"This discovery may hint at links between FRBs and those two kinds of events,” Tendulkar said. 

But some of the authors also cautioned that the repeating nature of FRB 121102 could indicate that it is somehow physically different than other known FRB's. FRB 121102 is not alone. The researchers also found a persistent source of radio waves in the same area of the sky, and the evidence suggests that both sources of radio waves are connected somehow; they either arose from the same source or are linked in some other way, the researchers said.  

The results of these studies will appear in three separate papers on Jan. 5 — one in the journal Nature and two in The Astrophysical Journal Letters.

Follow Calla Cofield @callacofield. Follow us @Spacedotcom, Facebook and Google+. Original article on Space.com.

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NASA Unveils 2 New Missions to Study Truly Strange Asteroids

NASA's next low-cost planetary missions will attempt to unravel the mysteries of some seriously bizarre asteroids.

The space agency has selected projects called Lucy and Psyche via its Discovery Program, which funds highly focused space missions to destinations throughout the solar system. The Lucy project will investigate the Trojan asteroids, which share an orbit with Jupiter, while Psyche will journey to the asteroid belt to study a huge, metallic asteroid named 16 Psyche that resides there.

"This is what Discovery Program missions are all about — boldly going to places we've never been to enable groundbreaking science," Thomas Zurbuchen, associate administrator for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington, D.C., said in a statement today (Jan. 4). [NASA Mission to Metal Asteroid Psyche (Images)]

Lucy is scheduled to launch in October 2021. If all goes according to plan, the probe will visit an asteroid in the main asteroid belt — located between Mars and Jupiter — in 2025, and then go on to study six Trojan asteroids between 2027 and 2033, NASA officials said.

(Left) Artist’s illustration of the Lucy spacecraft flying by the Trojan asteroid Eurybates. Trojans are fossils of planet formation and so will supply important clues to the earliest history of the solar system. (Right) Psyche, the first mission to the metal world 16 Psyche, will examine a landscape unlike anything explored before. Psyche will teach us about the hidden cores of the Earth, Mars, Mercury and Venus.

Credit: SwRI and SSL/Peter Rubin

This SPACE.com infographic takes a look at the strange magnetic asteroid Psyche, which may be all that remains of what was once a protoplanet in the early solar system. See the full Psyche asteroid explainer infographic here.

Credit: by Karl Tate, Infographics Artist

There are two streams of Trojan asteroids. One trails Jupiter, and the other leads the giant planet around the sun. Scientists think both streams may be planetary building blocks that formed far from the sun before being captured into their current orbits by Jupiter's powerful gravity.

"This is a unique opportunity," Lucy principal investigator Harold Levison, of the Southwest Research Institute in Boulder, Colorado, said in the same statement. "Because the Trojans are remnants of the primordial material that formed the outer planets, they hold vital clues to deciphering the history of the solar system. Lucy, like the human fossil for which it is named, will revolutionize the understanding of our origins."

Psyche will explore one of the oddest objects in the solar system — a 130-mile-wide (210 kilometers) metallic asteroid that may be the core of an ancient, Mars-size planet. Violent collisions billions of years ago might have stripped away the layers of rock that once lay atop this metallic object, scientists say.

"This is an opportunity to explore a new type of world — not one of rock or ice, but of metal," said Psyche principal investigator Lindy Elkins-Tanton, of Arizona State University. "16 Psyche is the only known object of its kind in the solar system, and this is the only way humans will ever visit a core. We learn about inner space by visiting outer space."

Psyche is scheduled to launch in October 2023 and arrive at the asteroid in 2030, NASA officials said.

Asteroid Basics: A Space Rock

Asteroids are fascinating for lots of reasons. They contain a variety of valuable resources and slam into our planet on a regular basis, occasionally snuffing out most of Earth's lifeforms. How much do you know about space rocks?

Lucy and Psyche were among five Discovery finalists that NASA announced last year. One of these other finalists, the dangerous-asteroid-hunting Near-Earth Object Camera (NEOCam), will get an additional year's worth of funding for continued development, NASA officials said.

The Discovery Program, which was founded in 1992, supports relatively low-cost planetary missions; development costs for the current crop are capped at about $450 million apiece, NASA officials said. The agency has funded 12 other Discovery missions in addition to those announced today, including the planet-hunting Kepler space telescope, the Dawn mission to the huge asteroids Vesta and Ceres, and the InSight Mars lander, which is due to launch next year.

 Follow Mike Wall on Twitter @michaeldwall and Google+. Follow us @Spacedotcom, Facebook or Google+. Originally published on Space.com.

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Bloke baffled by ‘Star Trek spaceship’ UFO hovering above lake for '2 to 3 hours'

A SENSATIONAL pic has emerged appearing to show a “Star Trek spaceship” hovering above a lake before zooming off.

By Douglas Patient 

GETTY/YOUTUBE/SECURETEAM10

Chad Haines was gobsmacked as he snapped the strange sight in Clarenville, Canada.

It hovered before moving up and down and then shooting out of sight quickly, Chad added.

He claims it was definitely not a plane and was far too big to be a drone.

YOUTUBE/SECURETEAM10

“It was out there for two or three hours. I couldn't believe it”

Chad Haines

He told local media: “It was out there for two or three hours.

“I couldn’t believe it.”

The snap was uploaded to YouTube by Tyler Glockner, UFO hunter and founder of Secure Team 10.

In the video he says: "Something’s caught flying in the skies over Canada.

"It looks like a saucer, it kind of looks like the Star Trek ship from the TV series."

According to Tyler, a UFO was spotted in the same place back in 1978.

The strange cigar-shaped craft hovering over Random Island was reported by a police officer.

This comes as a dad was baffled after seeing two UFOs hovering above Liverpool

While mysterious "alien coffins" were discovered near ancient pyramids.

And Daily Star Online revealed what you should do if you aliens invade Earth – you never know when you'll need it.

• Official UFO guide revealed: What to do if aliens invade Earth
• Mystery 'alien coffins' discovered near ancient pyramids
• Dad baffled as two UFOs hover above Liverpool in shock footage

{ http://www.dailystar.co.uk/ }

'Star Trek ship' spotted in the sky by UFO sceptic - who admits he's baffled by the sighting

The man said he was the 'last person' to believe in aliens - but admits he has no explanation for this strange object

BYKARA O'NEILL

A 'Star Trek' style spaceship has allegedly been spotted hovering in the sky in Canada.

Images of the strange object were captured by a self-proclaimed UFO sceptic who admitted he was the 'last person' to believe in aliens or extra-terrestrials.

The video has been uploaded to YouTube by Tyler Glockner, UFO hunter and founder of Secure Team 10.

In the clip, Tyler says: "Something [has been] caught flying in the skies over Canada.

"It looks like a saucer, it kind of looks like the Star Trek ship from the TV series."

The strange object was spotted over Random Island in Canada, by a man named Chad Haines.

After handing in the footage to a Canadian news site, Mr Haines admitted to reporters that he was the last person to believe in aliens , extra-terrestrials or UFOs.

But after witnessing the unidentified craft hovering in the sky near his house, he says he now can't explain what else it could have been.

READ MORE

• Alien enthusiasts find 'SPOON' in NASA images of Mars

Haines was deleting images off his camera in preparation when he stumbled upon photographs he'd taken earlier in the year.

He said the object was hovering over water 'near to the moon' and was visible for two to three hours.

After remaining still for most of that time, the object then moved up and down before rapidly shooting off out of sight.

READ MORE

• Massive object hidden under Antarctic ice could be a secret Nazi UFO base

Haines says the object definitely wasn't a plane, and said the UFO was far too large to be a drone.

According to Tyler, a sighting in the same place was spotted more than 37 years ago in 1978.

This time, it was a strange cigar-shaped craft hovering over Random Island. The police officer who spotted the object was subjected to so much ridicule that he barely mentioned the sighting ever again.

'Alien' signals are pinpointed: Mystery fast radio bursts are coming from a dwarf galaxy 3 billion light years away

• Fast radio bursts have been a mystery to astronomers since their discovery
• Now, for the first time, a source of these rare and brief waves has been identified
• The pulses were coming from a dwarf galaxy 3 billion light years from our planet
• Exactly how they are generated remains unknown, but they must be high-energy in order to travel that distance to us  

By Abigail Beall

Rare and brief bursts of cosmic radio waves have puzzled astronomers since they were first detected nearly 10 years ago.

Some suggested these mysterious bursts of energy could be a sign of alien life trying to contact us.

Now the signals have finally been tied to a source - a dwarf galaxy more than 3 billion light years from Earth.

Rare and brief bursts of cosmic radio waves have puzzled astronomers since they were first detected nearly 10 years ago. Now the signals have finally been tied to a source - a dwarf galaxy more than 3 billion light years from Earth.

Artist's impression pictured

Fast radio bursts, or FRBs, were first 'heard' by radio telescopes back in 2007. 

The signal was so temporary and seemingly random that it took years for astronomers to agree it was not a glitch in one of the telescope's instruments, and none of those first observed were ever seen again.

A repeating burst discovered in 2012, however, provided the opportunity for a team of researchers from the University of California, Berkeley and Cornell University to repeatedly monitor its area of the sky.

'We now know that this particular burst comes from a dwarf galaxy more than three billion light-years from Earth,' said Shami Chatterjee, of Cornell University.

'That simple fact is a huge advance in our understanding of these events,' he added. 

The team used the Karl Jansky Very Large Array in New Mexico and the Arecibo radio dish in Puerto Rico, in hopes of pinpointing its location.

'For a long time, we came up empty, then got a string of bursts that gave us exactly what we needed,' said Casey Law, from the University of California at Berkeley.

Using new software, the VLA last year detected a total of nine bursts over a period of a month, which was enough to pinpoint its location in the sky.

Further analysis by other telescopes allowed its location to be narrowed down.

'The VLA data allowed us to narrow down the position very accurately,' said Sarah Burke-Spolaor, of the National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO) and West Virginia University.

Berkeley's Casey Law says his favourite hypothesis about the origin of fast radio bursts is a magnetar surrounded by either material ejected by a supernova explosion.

Artist's impression of a supernova shown

The discovery that the bursts come from such a long distance away rules out any source in our own galaxy. 

'We now have ruled out those explanations, at least for this FRB.'

But exactly what is causing the bursts in the dwarf galaxy is still not known.

Extremely bright exploding stars, called superluminous supernovae, and long gamma ray bursts also occur in the type of galaxy discovered in the new paper.

Both are hypothesized to be associated with massive, highly magnetic and rapidly rotating neutron stars called magnetars.

'All these threads point to the idea that in this environment, something generates these magnetars,' Law said. 

'It could be created by a superluminous supernova or a long gamma ray burst, and then later on, as it evolves and its rotation slows down a bit, it produces these fast radio bursts as well as continuous radio emission powered by that spindown.

One alternative possibility is the galaxy's active nucleus, with radio emission coming from jets of material emitted from the region surrounding a supermassive black hole.

Artist's concept pictur

{

2017 a year of UFOs and Aliens? ET hunters watch for huge, 'incoming' piece of disclosure

The alien theory enthusiasts couldn't have bargained for a better start to the New year 2017, with the first notable UFO (Unidentified Flying Object) sighting of the year coming just days after the New Year's eve. Professional British UFO photographer John Moony spotted a mysterious flying craft over Newton Abbot, Devon. This literally out of the world incident, which took place around 1:30 p.m. local time on Monday, has encouraged the photographer to believe that 2017 will indeed prove to be a very vital year in terms of hunting extra terrestrial (ET) life in space.

Moony, one of the most distinguished contributors on World UFO Photos (an UFO dedicated website), stated that, he was sky watching, while after gazing through the blue for an hour or so suddenly he noticed a "faint contrail" over Newton Abbot's skies. It was hard to recognize the object from so far, so it was only after zooming in on that quickly ascending object with his Nikon P900 he could make out that the contrail was not coming from a plane but it was coming from a mystifying flying craft, which was shaped like a classic UFO.

"The round glowing object was at a very high altitude and I doubt that many people would be able to see this without a telephoto lens or a pair of high zoom binoculars. The object was moving at a high rate of speed across the sky and I had real trouble stabilizing it in the camera's viewfinder. I began taking photographs of this strange object and I managed to take six photographs that show the movement of this object," said John Moony, according to the Inquisitr.

The photographer seems to be quite positive about finding more extraterrestrial phenomena throughout this year and his optimism is well-grounded, as what he captured through his lens might just be the first UFO sighting of 2017. In 2016 we had many experts saying that 2017 might be the year of UFOs and ETs. Moony's finding at the very beginning more or less sealed it.

Scientists were excited earlier in 2016 when strange signals were detected from deep space. While many experts state that it is likely to be another false alarm, there is hope that significant news will arise from it either way.

Not only in Newton Abbot but New Year's Eve was rife with a number of interesting UFO-related news from around the globe. One of the most significant ones came from Queen Creek, Arizona, where witnesses reported seeing three mysterious lights slowly ascending to the sky. The lights most definitely evoked lots of speculations and theories with a number of them saying the lights might not be of this world at all.

While the actual source or justification of those lights is still unknown, skeptics have already given their share of explanations.

According to Sputnik News, Julie Baumann, one of the witnesses and a consultant for marketing company Isagenix, stated: "I just saw these three lights consecutively spaced out and they were close so it definitely caught my eye. They were moving slow. They didn't speed up or slow down. We were looking at it, all of us and we were going 'Okay, it's definitely just paper lanterns.' The other three were like a ball of light and the last one just looked like a plastic bag floating in the wind. It draws that curiosity of what could it be and aliens and I know people want to believe what they want to believe... but I saw three lit paper bags and one unlit paper bag."

Unsurprisingly, while some agree with Baumann's explanation, some strongly differ with it. Just like other UFO sightings it will be extremely difficult to prove who's right!

These UFO sightings of this year might just increase in number if we go by a very famous theory by some of the researches, according to which, a mysterious unknown object, an 'alien probe', is set to fly past Earth in 2017. The strange object which is now known as 1991 VG, was first spotted way back in November 1991 by astronomer James Scotti at the University of Arizona.

Initially it was suggested to be a section of Apollo 12 rocket, but Scotti claims that the timings do not match and instantly dismissed the notion as a ridiculous idea designed to cover up the reality of the situation!

When Scotti first spotted this mysterious strange object which is now called 1991 VG, it was about 10 metres in diameter, passing 280,000 miles from Earth – around 50,000 miles further than the Earth and the moon.

An artists Impression of this unknown potential Alien probe

This strange object showed an unusual rapid rate of rotation and its brightness appeared to fluctuate. This behaviour has not ever been seen before from any asteroid of its size – This mysterious object also had an orbit that was strikingly similar to that of Earth.

Once data was gathered on 1991 VG, Scotti realised this was the second time the unidentified object had passed Earth. The first was March of 1975.

Many truth seekers around the world are excited about this discovery and believe this could be a huge 'incoming' piece of disclosure in 2017, citing Steele's work as their source piece of evidence. When it does fly past Earth sometime in the summer of 2017, it will only be seen in the southern hemisphere.

The past year has already been filled with numerous sightings, including Curiosity Rover sending evidences of life from Mars the now-infamous mass sightings in Turkey that triggered the hashtag #ufoattacktoturkey, which was spotted by numerous residents and strangely covered up by social media. With the frequency of UFO-related incidents being reported around the globe, it seems completely possible that something very significant is going to happen soon.

Some interesting facts about aliens:

1. More than 40,000 Americans have taken out insurance against being abducted by aliens.

2. According to a report it is illegal for U.S. citizens to have any contact with extraterrestrials or their vehicles under Title 14, Section 1211 of the Code of Federal regulations, implemented on July 16, 1969.

3. In a push to draw in more tourism and additionally extra terrestrials, the town of St Paul, Alberta made the world's first UFO landing site.

4. Edgar Mitchell, the 6th individual to stroll on the moon, guarantees that "outsiders have reached people a few times".

5. One of the Presidents of the World Chess Federation claims that he was abducted by aliens trusts that chess was concocted by 'outsiders'.

6. Astronomer Frank Drake made the first scientific attempt to contact extra-terrestrial life forms in 1960.

7. Ohio State University inquires about spotting a sign originating from almost 220 million light years away that was so intense, it was named the "Wow Signal".

8. Some firefighters in the USA are actually trained to deal with aliens in case of a UFO crash or invasion

9. Three Days into the Apollo 11 Mission, the team reported an interesting flying question not far away from their location. They accepted it was a bit of the disengaged SIV-B rocket. That is, until they realized, that it was more than 6,000 miles away. The group of NASA still can't clarify what sort of article it was.

10. The Crop Circles are often believed to be created by aliens, as there is no proper explanation behind this phenomenon.

11. In 1957 a Brazilian farmer reported that he was abducted by aliens , who covered him in gel and mated with him. Surprisingly he is not the only one to claim being abducted by aliens. Mr. Ilyumzhinov from Kalmykia claims he was kidnapped by outsiders wearing yellow spacesuits on the night of September 17, 1997.

12. Scientist were stunned when they discovered a little, half-crawl long outside article implanted inside of the skeletal stays of once French ruler, Napoleon Bonaparte. This appears to run as an inseparable unit with Bonaparte's own account of snatching when he vanished for a few days in July 1794, asserting he had been held detainee without wanting to by an 'interesting gathering of men'.

{ http://www.ibtimes.sg/ }

Source of weird space signals turns out to be weird, too

Fast radio bursts have puzzled scientists for a decade. Now a team has traced one source of those signals to a distant galaxy.

For a decade now, astronomers have been puzzled by phenomena called "fast radio bursts." These FRBs are what they sound like -- split-second radio signals -- and they're coming from a mysterious source (or sources) across the cosmos. Exploding black holes, magnetars, hypothetical blitzars and even aliens are among the suggested causes. Now, for the first time, scientists say they've traced one of the bursts to its source, but the revelation may only serve to deepen the mysteries of its origin.

A team at West Virginia University discovered the first FRB in 2007 using archived data from Australia's Parkes telescope collected in 2001. A dozen more bursts detected in subsequent years by different radio telescopes all seemed to be random one-off remnants of far-away colossal cosmic collisions reaching our world.

That is until an FRB signal that repeats itself was identified for the first time.

The mysterious signals are coming from a tiny galaxy in the constellation Auriga.

Photo by Gemini Observatory/AURA/NSF/NRC

On Wednesday at a meeting of the American Astronomical Society in Grapevine, Texas, an international team of scientists detailed a major breakthrough: they've been able to trace that repeating signal to a specific galaxy, another first.

"We know that at least one of these FRBs originated in a discrete source within a distant dwarf galaxy located some three billion light-years beyond our Milky Way Galaxy," said Shriharsh Tendulkar of McGill University and a member of the discovery team.

The astronomers traced repeating FRB 121102, which was first discovered in November of 2012 at the Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico, to the surprisingly tiny galaxy in the direction of the constellation Aurigia using the Very Large Array in New Mexico and other large telescopes.

The revelation only deepens the mystery of this odd phenomena, because the cosmic address they pinpointed is not at all what you'd expect.

"That's weird isn't it? You'd expect to find FRBs where there are more stars... more stars means more neutron stars," Tendulkar told a room of reporters and scientists at the meeting. He went on to explain that neutron stars -- remnants of massive stars -- are among the top candidates to explain FRBs.

The findings, which the scientists refer to as the first "localization" of a fast radio burst, are published in the journal Nature.

Locating the source of an FRB for the first time also opens a new pathway for studying parts of space beyond our own galaxy.

"This detection has really opened the gates to a new realm of science," Sarah Burke-Spolaor, who worked on tracing FRB 121102 to its source at the National Radio Astronomy Observatory told the audience. "This phenomenon is so well-tuned to explore the universe, particularly the space between galaxies ... We can study the structure and the content of this empty space."

In other words, the discovery could give scientists a new technique to see and study what's otherwise invisible between galaxies.

The fact that FRB 121102 sends repeating signals eliminates an early theory that suggested all FRBs were basically aftershocks of huge cosmic cataclysms. Knowing FRB 121102's repeating signal comes from a tiny galaxy makes it unlikely there's space-shaking collisions or explosions happening there multiple times per day.

One possible explanation is that there's more than one type of FRB.

-

The Gemini telescope in Hawaii was used to zoom in on the dwarf galaxy hosting the source of the signal.

"I think that this is a huge breakthrough but also extremely puzzling," Prof. Matthew Bailes, who is at Australia's Swinburne University of Technology and was involved in the discovery of the first fast radio burst in 2007, told me. "The nature of the host galaxy - a dwarf, was a bit of a shock. The proximity to an active galactic nuclei even more intriguing. Are there two or one class of FRB? We'll need to find more to get all the answers."

Big stuff can happen in a dwarf galaxy though, as UC Berkeley astronomer and team member Casey Law points out. Small galaxies can play host to major events like superluminous supernovae and long gamma ray bursts that are connected to magnetars, a crazy kind of neutron star with a powerful magnetic field that can give rise to powerful bursts of x-rays and gamma rays.

"All these threads point to the idea that in this environment, something generates these magnetars," Law said. "It could be created by a superluminous supernova or a long gamma-ray burst, and then later on, as it evolves and its rotation slows down a bit, it produces these fast radio bursts as well as continuous radio emission powered by that spin-down."

Hubble's best views of the mysteries of space (picture)

There are other possible origin stories, though.

A hypothetical object caused by a spinning pulsar collapsing into a black hole dubbed a "blitzar" was basically conceived in 2013 as a way to explain FRBs.

The detection of FRB 121102 by multiple radio telescopes would appear to rule out the most embarrassing possible cause seen in the past - some signals picked up a few years ago seemed at first like more fast radio bursts, but were later determined to be caused by someone opening a microwave oven door while it was running at the Parkes Observatory.

Then there is the explanation that none of the scientists directly involved with pinpointing FRB 121102 have mentioned, but that will probably continue to be associated with FRBs until their mysteries are solved: aliens.

At least one scientific organization is already looking into that possibility.

METI International (the acronym stands for Messaging Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence) pointed the Boquete Optical SETI Observatory in Panama toward FRB 121102 starting Tuesday evening and has so far spent a total of about an hour searching for evidence of advanced civilizations in the neighborhood.

"That's not a lot of time for a phenomenon known to be intermittent and unpredictable. So far we've found nothing that looks like the telltale sign of extraterrestrial technology," METI International President Douglas Vakoch told me shortly after the press conference concluded Wednesday.

Vakoch doesn't think there's any call for jumping to conclusions about FRBs coming from ancient advanced alien civilizations just yet, but says investigating for the possibility is good practice for the day evidence of an alien civilization is detected and follow-up observations are needed.

Ironically, FRB 121102 itself actually helps discredit one of the early notions around FRBs that seemed to point to a pattern behind the bursts - a pattern that some believed couldn't be a coincidence and may have been designed by something intelligent, perhaps?

The year's wackiest 'evidence' aliens and UFOs are real

(picture)

As it turns out, the pattern only applied to the first ten FRBs recorded and others that followed, including FRB 121102, didn't fit the pattern. Sorry, E.T. We haven't received your call just yet.

While we're just beginning to understand these strange space signals better through FRB 121102, there's likely to be many more opportunities on the way, as it's believed that if we could observe and process incoming data from the entire sky, we'd likely find that earth is actually being bombarded with FRBs all the time.

"Finding the host galaxy of this FRB, and its distance, is a big step forward, but we still have much more to do before we fully understand what these things are," team leader Shami Chatterjee of Cornell University said.

Watch the World's First Mech Dance Around a Lab

Mike Brown

Method-2, the world’s first mech, is something to behold. After it was unveiled late last month, the internet has been abuzz with uses for Hankook Mirae Technology’s creation. Just days after the reveal, designer Vitaly Bulgarov uploaded a new video on Saturday of the machine doing a merry jig in the South Korean firm’s lab.

Sure, today it’s dancing, but one day it could be used for a whole number of applications. Yang Jin-ho, the brains behind the project, made it simply because mechs are awesome. Which they are! But at a cost of 242 billion won (around $200 million), it’s probably best to come up with a real-world application at some point.

It’s a beast: the machine stands 13 feet high, weighs over 1.5 tons, and each arm weighs nearly 200 pounds. Bulgarov has worked on the designs of films like Terminator and Transformers, and those influences are on display in Yang’s creation.

There are plenty of changes that still need to be made before the bot is production-ready. For starters, it’s still tethered to a power source. As the team conducts more experiments, it may become clearer what the best uses for the bot are, meaning the team can focus on making the improvements that are going to best benefit the bot’s use cases.

“We’re currently revising the frame to reduce the vibration,” Bulgarov said in the video’s description.

Watch the video of Method-2 making some of its first steps here:

Photos via Getty Images, Vitaly Bulgarov/Facebook, Getty Images / Chung Sung-Jun

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A mysterious object will pass near Earth in 2017. Scientists are baffled about its origin!

(Before It's News)

This mysterious object is known as 1991 VG and it was first spotted in November 1991 by astronomer James Scotti at the University of Arizona. Today, many conspiracy theorists think that this is a genuine  “alien probe”, which is deliberately set to fly near Earth in 2017.

The object has confused astronomers ever since it was first spotted, mainly because of its strange rotation and longevity in space. Some people think that this is a section of the Apollo 12 rocket, but according to Scotti it is probably something else:

An artistic depiction of what the “alien probe” may look like.
“We looked into all the possibilities for it being man-made. There were a few possible spacecraft and rocket bodies that might be 1991 VG. But, when we looked into each, we were able to eliminate each of them

According to other people, the strange object may also be a secret Soviet rocket from the Space Race era. It is a fact that the Soviets had equally powerful rockets as the American ones and it is quite possible that they launched one to get to the moon and covered it up if things went badly.

This is the orbit of VG 1991. Scotti realised that this object had passed Earth one more time in March 1975. 
When 1991 VG was first spotted, it was around 10 metres in diameter, passing 280,000 miles from Earth – around 50,000 miles further than the Earth and the moon. The object showed a rapid rate of rotation and its brightness fluctuated. At that time, this kind of behaviour was not observed at any asteroid of similar size. The object’s orbit was also similar to Earth’s orbit.

After gathering more information about 1991 VG, Scotti realised that this object had passed Earth one more time in March 1975. Again this is something that is not characteristic for an asteroid. They don’t tend to pass twice in the same spot

Duncan Steel, an astronomer at University of Adelaide, suggested it might be an “alien probe observed in the vicinity of our planet.” He only mentioned this theory in order to disprove it. In further interviews, he has stated that he isn’t convinced that VG 1991 is of extraterrestrial origin.

This hasn’t stopped conspiracy theorists from continuing to spread the idea of an extraterrestrial origin of the object. They still keep citing Steele’s work as their main source.

Nostradamus is quoted as saying mankind would discover a machine in space that was sent to us by the WATCHERS! in 2017!

{ http://beforeitsnews.com/ }

NASA footage shows mysterious flying saucer UFO sailing above Earth’s atmosphere in space [Video]

It is being claimed that an alien flying saucer UFO was recorded in Earth’s atmosphere. This footage was excerpted by Alien hunters.

Footage from NASA’s ISS live stream uploaded to YouTube on September 27, 2016, by user UFO Sightings, titled “New NASA uncut footage shows clear UFO,” purports to show a UFO flying in space past NASA’s HD cameras on board the ISS.

According to UFO hunters, the flying saucer may have been flying out or entering into the Earth’s atmosphere at the time it was captured on camera. Although most analysts described the mysterious object as disc-shaped, the footage reveals a v-shaped indentation in the rear in contrast with a curved front (see video below).

The footage, according to YouTube UFO hunters, shows clear evidence of alien UFO activity above Earth’s atmosphere.

Enthusiasts debated the veracity of the claim that it provides conclusive evidence of extraterrestrial presence in our solar system and alien UFOs visiting Earth, according to Mirror.

Skeptics tried as usual to debunk the claim that the flying object was an alien UFO. Many suggested it could have been space junk making re-entry into the Earth’s atmosphere.

But a believer pointed out that the object could not have been space junk because space junk and natural space bodies falling under the force of gravity normally spin, rotate or tumble. But the object shown in the video appeared to be stabilized and thus could not have been a natural space body or space junk making re-entry into the Earth’s atmosphere.

“If that was space junk, I would have expected it to be rotating or spinning,” the viewer commented, according to HNGN. “If an object is in a very low orbit, the upper atmosphere is going to cause it to spin, unless it’s made like a dart. This object seemed to be stable. Meaning it…. was a spacecraft, flying under control of technology that stabilized its flight.”

Some skeptics wondered aloud why UFO videos tend always to be blurred, thus making it difficult to identify the alleged extraterrestrial craft.

“OMG! An alien spaceship just entered our planet,” a skeptic commented sarcastically. “Quick, grab our worst possible camera.”

“UFOs entering our airspace should be registered and required to pay for a permit or license and be regulated as to flight paths,” another skeptic joked. “Given the multitude of ‘sightings’ on YouTube the money collected could resolve our national debt.”

The latest alleged UFO sighting is remarkably similar to a sighting first reported on July 9, 2016, by UFO hunter Streecap1. UFO hunters claimed that the footage, taken from the live ISS stream, showed an alien UFO making a stealth incursion into the Earth’s atmosphere.

In the description of his YouTube video titled “UFO Enters Earth’s Atmosphere,” Streetcap1 acknowledged that the mysterious object shown entering into the Earth’s atmosphere from space could have been a meteor. But a singular reason to suspect that it was an alien UFO was that NASA prevented alien hunters from having a closer look at it by quickly cutting live transmission.

The alien hunter also argued that the object was likely an alien craft because just before NASA cut the video feed, it was seen slowing down and hovering momentarily above Earth’s atmosphere.
UFO Sightings Hotspot agreed with Streetcap1 that NASA would not have cut transmission had the object been a natural space body, such as a meteor.

UFO hunters believe that NASA has a policy of covering up UFO evidence to prevent people from knowing the truth about the presence of technologically advanced extraterrestrial species in our solar system and alien UFOs visiting our planet.

“At first glance it could be a natural object like a meteor or an artificial object like space junk or a satellite, but what made it interesting was that NASA cut the live camera feed just at the moment the UFO seemed to stop just above earth’s atmosphere,” UFO Sightings Hotspot commented. “If it [was a] recognizable and identified object then there is no reason to shut down the live streaming.”

But other UFO analysts, such as Scott C. Waring, disagreed that the flying object could have been a meteor. Waring suggested on his UFO Sightings Daily that it could have been the Chinese space station Tiangong-1, China’s first unmanned space station, launched into orbit in September 2011.

“I have watched the International Space Station a lot over the last 6 years and I can tell you that this is not the moon, nor a meteor,” Waring commented. “It may be the Chinese space station cargo ship, called Tiangong-1, or the other one Tangong-2.”

Repeated allegations against NASA that it deliberately shuts down live transmission to hide UFOs that appear on its live ISS stream have forced the agency to issue multiple denials, the Inquisitr reported.

(Inquisitr.com)

{ http://mirrorspectrum.com/behind-the-mirror }

UFO filmed today 04.01.2017 slow motion shots are very mysterious transition to another dimension ?

{ https://www.youtube.com/ }

Vlaanderen ziet bijna de helft minder ufo's: voor 3 waarnemingen was er geen verklaring - HLN.be

door Koen Van De Sype 

 Bron: Belga, Eigen berichtgeving

© Belgisch UFO-meldpunt.

UFO'S Het aantal ufomeldingen is vorig jaar bijna gehalveerd in vergelijking met het jaar ervoor. Er werden 143 meldingen genoteerd in 2016 en dat waren er 89 minder dan in 2015, toen 232 meldingen binnenkwamen. "Hoofdreden is vermoedelijk de nieuwe methode die we hanteren voor het registreren", aldus Frederick Delaere - zelf een non-believer - van het Belgisch UFO-meldpunt, "maar het verklaart niet alles."

Een en ander staat te lezen in het 52-bladzijden tellende jaarverslag 2016 van het 'Belgisch UFO-meldpunt'. Daaruit kan verder worden opgemaakt dat de meeste meldingen binnenlopen in de maand januari. "Vermoedelijk is de media-aandacht die gegenereerd werd door de publicatie van het vorige jaarverslag, hier verantwoordelijk voor", zo staat in het verslag.

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• Tegen 2018 op de maan, tegen 2020 naar Mars: China onthult ambitieuze ruimtevaartplannen
• Een echte Super Mario zou alle wereldrecords breken

De 143 waarnemingen van het ufomeldpunt zijn waarnemingen in Vlaanderen, want daarnaast is er nog een ander centrum, het Comité Belge pour l'Etude des Phénomènes Spatiaux (COBEPS), dat meldingen in Franstalig België registreert. Die noteerde 74 meldingen voor 2016, in 2015 waren dat er nog 93. Wat de 143 Vlaamse meldingen betreft, kwamen de meeste uit de provincies Oost-Vlaanderen (33) en Antwerpen (30)

Wensballonnen

"Maar dat verklaart niet de volledige daling", aldus Delaere. "In Wallonië gebruiken ze nog dezelfde methodiek als vroeger en daar loopt het aantal meldingen ook terug. De piek in 2011 en 2012 was volgens ons overigens vooral te wijten aan de hype rond wensballonnen die er toen was."

Waarnemingen krijgen de status van "hoge vreemdheid" toebedeeld, wanneer ze aan bepaalde criteria voldoen. Hoewel de getuigen aangespoord werden om hun meldingen zo gedetailleerd mogelijk te beschrijven, kreeg het grootste deel (51 meldingen) van de binnengekomen waarnemingen "gegevens onvoldoende" als evaluatie. Deze meldingen bevatten voor het meldpunt te weinig bruikbare gegevens om een eventuele verklaring te kunnen geven of een verder onderzoek te starten.

Meteoren

Bij de verklaringen voor de beschreven en vaak ook gefotografeerde of gefilmde "niet geïdentificeerde vliegende voorwerpen" noemt het Belgisch UFO-meldpunt in zijn jaarverslag onder meer "meteoren of ruimteschroot, ballonnen, satellieten (inclusief ISS), vliegtuigen en helikopters, vogels en drones". Het laat zich aanzien dat vooral laatstgenoemde verklaringsgrond de komende jaren nog in aantal zal toenemen.

In totaal bleken amper drie meldingen niet te verklaren te zijn. "Zo werd er in Lembeke een toestel gespot met een raster onderaan", aldus Delaere. "We vermoeden dat het een vliegtuig was, maar konden geen toestel identificeren dat daar voorbij gevlogen zou zijn. De getuige leek ons wél betrouwbaar."

Drone

En er was ook een melding van een vreemd voorwerp in de Oost-Vlaamse gemeente Wachtebeke, vlakbij het provinciaal domein Puyenbroek. "Het deed wat denken aan een drone, maar aangezien er in die regio een verbod geldt op drones, hebben we deze waarneming ook als onverklaarbaar bestempeld", aldus nog Delaere.

Slaapverlamming

De vreemdste melding? "Dat was iemand die een wezen in haar slaapkamer had gezien", aldus Delaere. "Het gebeurde in Zoutleeuw. We vermoeden dat het hier ging om een geval van slaapverlamming. Patiënten zitten dan vast tussen slapen en waken en kunnen zich niet bewegen. Het is typisch dat ze dan vreemde figuren zien. Alle symptomen kwamen hiermee overeen."

{ http://www.hln.be/  }

Wetenschappers ontdekken nieuw orgaan bij de mens. Alleen waarvoor dient het? - HLN.be

 Bron: Die Welt, The Independent

De verschillende delen van het mesenterium 

© Coffey en O'Leary.

Er is een nieuw orgaan ontdekt in het menselijk lichaam. Het gaat om het 'mesenterium' waarvan wetenschappers eeuwenlang dachten dat het uit verschillende delen bestond maar het blijkt nu één afzonderlijk geheel te vormen in ons maag-darmstelsel. Maar de functie van dit nieuwe orgaan stelt onderzoekers voorlopig voor een raadsel.

"Deze vondst opent een heel nieuw gebied voor de wetenschap", verklaarde de Ierse onderzoeker J. Calvin Coffey die de ontdekking deed. "We hebben al de anatomie en de structuur van het orgaan ontleed, nu moeten nog te weten komen wat de eigenlijke functie ervan is", aldus de vorser van het universitaire ziekenhuis in het Ierse Limerick. 

"Eens je weet wat de functie van dit orgaan is, kan je ook achterhalen wanneer het mesenterium niet normaal functioneert en bepaalde ziektes vaststellen."

Dubbele plooi
Het mesenterium is eigenlijk een dubbele plooi van het buikvlies dat onze buikholte bekleedt. Het hecht onze darmen vast aan de binnenkant van onze onderbuik en houdt alles op zijn plaats.

De ontdekking werd uitvoerig beschreven in het gerenommeerd wetenschappelijk vakblad The Lancet. Alle medische naslagwerken krijgen een update zodat geneeskundestudenten voortaan leren dat het mesenterium een afzonderlijk orgaan is. 

Da Vinci
Het was Leonardo Da Vinci die in 1508 het mesenterium voor het eerst beschreef. Daarna werd het eeuwenlang genegeerd omdat het als onbetekenend werd beschouwd. Tot de Ier Coffey deze belangrijke ontdekking deed.

Het menselijk lichaam telt nu 79 organen.

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{ http://www.hln.be/ }

LONDON PHYSICIST CONFIDENT: 2017 WILL BE THE BREAKTHROUGH YEAR FOR DISCOVERING ALIEN LIFE

6 Hidden Clues Behind Mysterious Ancient Civilizations, Were Aliens Responsible? Jan 2017, Video, UFO Sighting News.

Date of video: Jan 3, 2017
Maker of video: Strange Mysteries of Youtube

Here is a thought provoking video about some ancient mysteries that are still being questioned about if aliens were or were not involved in making these ancient civilizations. The more we learn, the more questions we have. I am confident aliens have been here for millions of years and have interfered with the rise and fall of many civilizations. 
Scott C. Waring

Video states:

The Seven Mayan Prophecies foretold by the Mayan people claimed that a series of devastating events would occur to humanity beginning in 1999 and ending with Earth's apparent destruction on December 21st 2012. The ancient kingdoms of Egypt, Greece and the Mycenaeans were some of the most influential civilizations in human history, with many of their teachings and discoveries forming the basis of our modern scientific, religious and philosophical ideas. The Nazca Civilization existed in modern-day Peru between 100BC and 800AD, and this intriguing society seemed strangely advanced considering when and where they lived. The Sumerian people of southern-Mesopotamia were one of if not the very first examples of civilised society here on Earth, yet we still have a lot of questions about where these people came from, where their language was derived from, and where their genetic descendants are today. In the centuries since the west first clasped eyes on Easter Island's Moai statues, archaeologists have been confused over how the relatively primitive Rapa Nui people moved these big hunks of rock. Here's another mysterious bunch of old timey rocks for you, and we still don't know exactly how the Stone-age people of southern-Britain built this astonishing rock formation either. Viking lore is well known to many of us today thanks to the simple fact that it contains all kinds of awesome, but what remained a mystery for quite some time was exactly how these sea-faring Scandinavians interacted with their Norse mythology on a daily basis.

{ http://www.ufosightingsdaily.com/ }

UFO Moves Over Small Town As They Sleep, Aug 15, 2016, Video, UFO Sighting News.

Date of sighting: Aug 15, 2016 but reported in Dec 2016
Location of sighting: Bolton, GB
Source: MUFON 79014

This UFO would be mistaken by many to be a meteor, but it has no tail and is moving very slowly at a horizontal position. The object is bright and not too far above the city. Caught by a home security camera, the UFO would have normal gone unnoticed, but cams are becoming the essential tools that will bring about disclosure. 
Scott C. Waring

Eyewitness states:

We were actually on holiday away from home when we caught this ufo on our surveillance camera at home. We noticed the following morning that we had captured something strange. We cannot find anyone else at this moment in time who saw it too but to record it on video I think is very lucky. On the video it has recorded the date and time. On the video after our security light comes on and then goes off a few seconds later, above the neighbours houses but further away a light appears to the centre of the screen. This light seems to have a trail after it. We thought we were watching a meteor at first but realising it was quite big and not straight up in the sky, it would have to be pretty close to the earth if it was. Also, the light changes direction, it actually turns around and comes a little closer as it goes back to the same direction it came from. The light comes into view in the centre of the screen and moves left, when it turns around it slightly disappears behind a tree but can still be seen. When it comes back it seems to come closer and moves off to the right and in the same direction it came from. I feel as it was moving over some water to the outskirts of our village.

{ http://www.ufosightingsdaily.com/ }

Ball of Light Splits Into Three In The Dark Sky

This footage from the last year has made rounds online showing one strange bright round object in the sky that bursts into three.

Jared A, a YouTube user, drove along Alaska at three early in the morning when he noticed a burning bright light.

He was able to grab a camera and record the object split into two. One of them had vanished, and the other one erupted into three separate lights, which then formed a triangle in the sky and disappeared.

Jared posted the video to YouTube first, but more detailed explanations were shared on Reddit.

He wrote that he was about to approach the Morris Thompson Visiter Centre area when he looked up again and spotted a bright light went straight down and vanished.

Jared said that the one shown in the video just kept on flashing. He felt afraid but excited at the same time with the anomaly he witnessed.

He also pointed out that the object was brighter than in the video.

Some UFO enthusiasts believe the object is from another planet. One Reddit user described it as genuinely unearthly that might make to history books.

Another user said that it was just amazing to see in the video one light split into two and then three different objects separately.

As expected, not everyone was convinced about the UFO theory.

A YouTube user said that it looked more of strobes on a helicopter.

Another one said that it was just a weather balloon.

{ http://www.latest-ufo-sightings.net/ }

Alien UFO Reportedly Sprays Poisonous Chemicals

The Mutual UFO Network (MUFON) are investigating the photographs from the sighting of a flying saucer that snapped over homes and allegedly sprayed chemicals into the air.

The unnamed witness said that he happened to look up and saw what he first thought a passenger plane on fire.

A few seconds later, he realized that it was not a plane. He described the aerial thing as a blunt silver-domed object having orange lights around the UFO’s middle. He added that it was a usual domed UFO looking craft.

Eventually, it became apparent to the witness that the craft was in trouble. The witness saw no flame or intense burning, but some kind of a vapor trail was left. He said that the vapor trail did not appear to be from any place on the craft. It nearly enshrouded the craft, slipped off and fell behind. The trail then dissipated within seconds later, according to the witness.

He thought the trail was radioactive or highly poisonous. He noticed an increased intensity of the rumbling hiss as the craft left the smoke.

The sighting took place on July 20, 2013, at around 11 am in Huntington Beach, California, but has only been reported to MUFON recently.

The witness estimated the object to be a mile away, moving to south or southwest. He further guessed the size to be the same of a school bus at approximately 35 to 40 feet wide.

The witness managed to get photos of the mysterious aerial thing as it moved from right to left towards the coast.

{ http://www.latest-ufo-sightings.net/ }

UFO Disguised As Jet Over Newton Abbot, England On Jan 2017, Photos, UFO Sighting News.

Above is original, below is added darkness to make the UFO stand out. 

Date of sighting: Jan 3, 2017
Location of sighting: Newton Abbot, England
News source:

http://www.torquayheraldexpress.co.uk/first-ufo-of-2017-spotted-by-world-ufo-expert-over-newton-abbot/story-30027444-detail/story.html

UFOs do make trails behind them sometimes, but they do it on purpose. UFOs make cloud tunnels for others to follow safely inside without being seen, but here its trying to look like a jet. Such antics by aliens works more often than not, so its difficult to laugh at them when the majority of the world is still in the dark about the existence aliens. When looking at the UFO, you see its bottom is in the shape of an alien face, the face of the species flying it. 

This sighting is right next to the English Channel where only a few km away isGuernsey...an island where two planes recorded several yellow mile long disks over the ocean...an area of French military airspace, which shows the French have allotted a area of ocean to the aliens. 
Scott C. Waring

News states:

A PROFESSIONAL UFO spotter has captured pictures of his first UFO of 2017. John Mooner, from Newton Abbot, who calls himself the chief photographer for World UFO Photos, snapped the strange object when he was 'sky watching' on Monday at around 1.30pm. 

Mr Mooner said: "I decided to go out sky watching and I had my trusty Nikon P900 camera at the ready. "After about an hour of sky watching I spotted a faint contrail and began to zoom in. "At a higher magnification I could clearly see that this contrail was not coming from a plane, but was in fact coming from a round object that appeared to be glowing. "The round glowing object was at a very high altitude and I doubt that many people would be able to see this without a telephoto lens or a pair of high zoom binoculars. "The object was moving at a high rate of speed across the sky and I had real trouble stabilizing it in the camera's viewfinder. "I began taking photographs of this strange object and I managed to take six photographs that show the movement of this object."
Mr Mooner, who call himself the chief photographer for World UFO Photos, said it was a good start to the year for UFO spotters. "This is my first UFO photographs of 2017 and I can't wait to photograph more UFOs over Devon," he added. 

{ http://www.ufosightingsdaily.com/ }

Nasa warns two asteroids OR comets are HURTLING towards Earth...but they're not sure which

NASA has revealed that TWO celestial objects are approaching Earth and are currently zooming through the solar system.

{ http://www.express.co.uk/ }

UFOs, Disclosure and Plan B

ByCheryl Costa

The truth embargo and official disclosure regarding extraterrestrials is still an issue.

Reality check: Hillary Clinton didn’t win the election so she will not be the disclosure president. But the truth embargo and official disclosure regarding extraterrestrials is still an issue. So it’s time for plan B: the Congressional Hearings Initiative.

In April and May of 2013, the Paradigm Research Group hosted the first citizen hearings on disclosure. The 30 hours of hearings were designed to look and feel like congressional hearings and even employed several former congressional representatives to chair the proceedings. The mainstream media yawned, made fun of and most certainly ignored the proceedings. Nobody in Congress stepped up to the plate and called for UFO disclosure hearings.

Without a doubt, it’s time for Congress to do its job and look into the truth embargo.

This issue really boils down to research money, and in our system of government for most major scientific research, the purse strings are held by Congress. The truth is, getting any kind of serious research done, like the kind that is done by the National Academy of Science, requires congressional support in the form of funding. If we’re talking about Congress, then we have to talk about voter numbers.

In 2012, National Geographic sponsored a national poll to measure interest on the topic of UFOs. The poll indicated that 36 percent of Americans, or about 80 million people, believe in UFOS.

In New York State, 36 percent translated to about 7.11 million, or most of upstate. The poll also found that 47 percent of Americans were on the fence about the topic and 17 percent flat out didn’t believe in UFOS.

Interestingly, the poll revealed that 80 percent believe that the government is hiding what it knows about UFOs. Nationally, that’s about 255 million people. Here in New York state, its 15.8 million of our 19.75 million residents. That’s a lot of voter interest in the topic of UFOs. These very same voters don’t think that the government isn’t being square with us.

Let’s think about this for a moment: Getting a member of Congress to call for hearings about UFOs carries a stiff media stigma that’s been culturally reinforced for over 50 years. In my opinion, what is needed is a team effort to give any one Congress member cover. This could be done by an individual state’s congressional delegation calling for such hearings.

In that line of thinking I have compiled a statistical list of the past 14 years worth of New York states’ 5,141 UFO sightings. The data has been gathered from the databases of National UFO Reporting Center and from the Mutual UFO Network.

I have ranked those UFO sighting statistics by New York Congressional Districts in the chart below:

Click to enlarge.

Click to enlarge.

As you can see from the data presented, there are many New York congressional districts that have large amounts of eye witness UFO reports.

Those 5,141 reports rank New York sixth in the nation. The United States as a whole logged over 100,000 sighting reports from 2001 through 2015, and sightings are on the rise.

Note that the 27th District in Western New York, the 21st District in the North Country, and the 1st District of Long Island are UFO sighting hot spots. With all the interest in border security we heard during the presidential election, you’d think the congressional representatives of the 1st, 21st and 27th border districts would be extremely interested in potential security issues.

Since 2001 we’ve all been asked to remove our shoes, have body pat downs in airports and most importantly told to “report what we see.” We’ve done our part. It is time for Congress to start asking serious questions about what goes on over our heads.

Perhaps a little plan B voter pressure might encourage our state’s congressional delegation to call for hearings on disclosure. I encourage my New York state readers to contact their congress person and ask them to support hearings.

 

{ http://www.syracusenewtimes.com/ }

‘Flaming UFO’ lights up skies over Devon for three hours

Tanveer Mann for Metro.co.uk

A ‘flaming UFO’ has been spotted soaring above Exmouth in Devon. 

UFO investigator ‘vomited two litres of black fluid before he died’

At least that’s what this musician claims he saw shortly after 1pm on Wednesday.

According to Mark Emmins, the oval-shaped luminous object appeared in the sky and remained there for about three hours.

His friend, Tyron Osborne, snapped the rare sight as the pair looked on in amazement, convinced it was a UFO.

Posting pictures online, Mark wrote: ‘Today for the second time in my life I can honestly say that myself and my neighbour watched a UFO.

Aliens are sucking energy from the sun – and UFO fans caught one on camera

‘It was stood still in the sky for some hours and then decided to move and then vanish. We got photos too.’

The object, which is most likely not a UFO, was initially dismissed as a star, but Mark insists he later windows on it.

He said: ‘If you look closely you can see what appears to be windows. I have never seen anything like this.

‘As for believing in aliens, I’ve always thought we are not alone in the universe and hoped to see something that would make me believe they would visit us.

Rare UFO-like fog dome appears in sky as temperatures drop to -4C

‘I didn’t expect it to actually happen.’

Mark believes the object came from the US after he noticed it was traveling east from Dawlish.

His post led to dozens of people speculating at what it could be, with most people saying it was probably not a UFO.

Wendy Seaman wrote: ‘Looks like the Enterprise. Are you sure it wasn’t a satellite, one goes over about 4ish daily. When its a clear day you can see it clearly.’

Paul Oxenham said: ‘It could have been someone’s drone.’

But Steph Pommier wasn’t going to put it off that easily, writing: ‘UFOs have been spotted since the beginning of Man. Just accept it. We cannot know nor control everything.’

{ http://metro.co.uk/news/ }

First UFO of 2017 spotted by world UFO expert over Newton Abbot

A PROFESSIONAL UFO spotter has captured pictures of his first UFO of 2017.

John Mooner, from Newton Abbot, who calls himself the chief photographer for World UFO Photos, snapped the strange object when he was 'sky watching' on Monday at around 1.30pm.

"After about an hour of sky watching I spotted a faint contrail and began to zoom in. 

"At a higher magnification I could clearly see that this contrail was not coming from a plane, but was in fact coming from a round object that appeared to be glowing. 

"The round glowing object was at a very high altitude and I doubt that many people would be able to see this without a telephoto lens or a pair of high zoom binoculars. 

"The object was moving at a high rate of speed across the sky and I had real trouble stabilizing it in the camera's viewfinder. 

"I began taking photographs of this strange object and I managed to take six photographs that show the movement of this object."

Mr Mooner, who call himself the chief photographer for World UFO Photos, said it was a good start to the year for UFO spotters. 

"This is my first UFO photographs of 2017 and I can't wait to photograph more UFOs over Devon," he added. 

READ MORE

World expert snaps picture of UFO 'landing in field to abduct cows for genetic material' in Dawlish

Could these photos prove that aliens are flying over Newton Abbot?

Could it be cider? Seven reasons why aliens love Newton Abbot

Could this image be definitive proof that aliens have landed on Earth and living in Newton Abbot?

Could surrounding quarries and being close to Dartmoor make Newton Abbot a UFO hotspot?

{ http://www.torquayheraldexpress.co.uk/ }

A Promising Spot for Life on Mars

The main goal of the Mars Curiosity mission is to determine whether the area around Gale Crater offered an environment favorable for microbes.

Credit: NASA

As NASA's Mars rover Curiosity makes its way up the central peak of Gale Crater, it has been gathering evidence from ancient lake beds and long ago groundwater environments that are promising for life.

Scientists in charge of the mission gave an update of their findings Dec. 13 at the American Geophysical Union's annual fall meeting in San Francisco, saying the landing site at Gale Crater had exceeded their expectations. They said they have "hit a jackpot" of exposed mineral layers as the rover moves up Mount Sharp, offering a glimpse into the geologic history of the site and how global environmental conditions might have changed on Mars over the course of millions of years.

"We see all of the properties in place that we really like to associate with habitability," said mission team member John Grotzinger, a geologist at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena. "There's nothing extreme here. This is all good for habitability over time." [The Life on Mars Search: Photo Time Line]

Gale Crater is the lowest point within thousands of kilometers in all directions, and scientists believe water once pooled there into a lake and also seeped underground. They believe the groundwater may have persisted even after the surface water dried up, offering a prolonged period for life to persist. So far, there's been no evidence of life, microbial or otherwise, but if Mars did once support living organisms, this would have been one of the most likely spots on the Red Planet.

After traveling 9 miles (15 kilometers) from its landing site, Curiosity has now entered a critical part of its mission, boring into the exposed mudstone every 82 feet (25 meters) as it goes uphill to progressively younger layers and analyzing the contents of the fractured rock.

"You might think mudstones would be boring, but they're definitely not," said Curiosity deputy project scientist Joy Crisp, of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena.

One clue to the changing conditions is the type of iron oxide present in the rocks. The lower, more ancient layers appear to be dominated by the mineral magnetite, indicating less weathering in the environment. Meanwhile, the upper rock layers show a greater amount of oxidizing hematite, a sign of chemical reactivity that would indicate a more acidic environment, though not extremely so.

NASA's Mars rover Curiosity at the base of Mount Sharp.

Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

"It's acidic, but never super-acidic. It's totally the kind of environment where an acidophilic organism could enjoy it," said Grotzinger.

Curiosity has also detected the element boron for the first time on Mars, and it’s appearing within mineral veins that are mainly comprised of calcium sulfate. On Earth, boron — or rather, a certain form of it — is a component in the formation of RNA, usually found in arid sites with much-evaporated water like in Death Valley National Park in California.

"The only problem with this is, we don't know what form of boron it is," said Patrick Gasda, of Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico. If the kind of boron present on Mars is found to be similar to what we see on Earth, that would be a strong sign that the ancient groundwater that formed these veins would have been between 32 degrees and 140 degrees Fahrenheit (0 to 60 degrees Celsius) and a neutral-to-alkaline pH, making the location entirely plausible for life, researchers said.

The boron was identified by Curiosity's ChemCam instrument, a laser-shooting device that vaporizes materials and then uses a spectrograph to analyze the elemental composition of the resulting plasma of super-heated ions and electrons. The scientists propose that the boron was deposited there by moving water, suggesting a dynamic system in which minerals and elements interacted with groundwater and surface water as it moved through the landscape.

"We are seeing chemical complexity indicating a long, interactive history with the water," said Grotzinger. "The more complicated the chemistry is, the better it is for habitability. The boron, hematite and clay minerals underline the mobility of elements and electrons, and that is good for life."

Curiosity's laser-induced remote sensing for chemistry and micro-imaging instruments identifies atomic elements like boron in Martian rocks.

Credit: NASA/JPL/Caltech/ LANL

The scientists also gave a brief update on how Curiosity is faring. The rover continues to operate, although it has faced some recent malfunctions, including a break in the motor of the drill feed, a piece responsible for moving the drill up and down during rock sampling. Mission scientists are currently troubleshooting that problem with the hope of keeping the Curiosity drill going, though the rover has already well exceeded its nominal two-year mission that began in 2012.

This story was provided by Astrobiology Magazine, a web-based publication sponsored by the NASA astrobiology program. Follow Space.com @Spacedotcom, Facebook and Google+.  Story posted on Space.com. 

{ http://www.space.com/ }

Earth Scientists Are Freaking Out. NASA Urges Calm.

"We don't do policy in NASA," said Michael Freilich, head of the agency's Earth Science Division.

Credit: NASA

At a time when NASA earth scientists are concerned their research may be scuttled by the incoming Trump administration, the space agency's top science official is preaching pragmatism and unity.

The names of the two key Trump administration figures who will have the most significant impact on NASA's future — the new NASA administrator and the director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy — have not been announced. To put that in scientific terms, all the rumor and discussion swirling around the scientific community about NASA's future under a Trump presidency is noise, "not signal," said Thomas Zurbuchen, who took over as the leader of NASA's Science Mission Directorate in October.

"You are leaders in your community, please be a source of signal, not a source of noise," Zurbuchen said Dec. 12 during the annual Earth Science Town Hall meeting at the American Geophysical Union conference in San Francisco. [Analysis: The Biggest Space Issues Facing the Trump Administration]

Although it is possible that NASA's Earth Science program "might get somewhat smaller in the new administration, it is not at all obvious to me that is going to happen," said Michael Freilich, NASA Earth Science Division director. "I am actually optimistic the benefits will be recognized as they have in the past."

"You have earned tremendous credibility from your work over the years," Freilich said through a two-way internet link that allowed him to interact with people at the town hall from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida, where he was awaiting the launch of NASA's Cyclone Global Navigation Satellite System. "You earned that credibility by being good scientists, by being logical, attacking problems and letting the data speak for themselves. We don't do policy in NASA. We provide the information for all the policymakers to draw their own conclusions."

Even if NASA's Earth science program shrinks, scientists should focus diligently on their work instead of "spending time pining for what could have been," Freilich said.

Zurbuchen also emphasized the importance of producing high-quality research. "Let's behave like scientists and deal with absolute ethics with our science," he said. "At the end, history will judge us by whether we did the right thing."

Funding for NASA's Earth science program has traditionally waxed and waned with changing administrations. Funding as a percent of NASA's overall budget declined sharply from 2001 to 2006, the early years of the George W. Bush presidency, dipping from about 11 percent of NASA's budget to six percent. It was not until NASA's first Earth science decadal survey published in January 2007 declared that the space agency's Earth-observing satellite system "was in danger of collapsing" that funding began to rise, Freilich said.

Since 2007, NASA's Earth science budget has climbed back up to comprise about 10 percent of the agency's budget, nearly $1.93 billion in 2016. With the money appropriated since 2007, NASA has "truly revitalized our space-based Earth-observation system," Freilich said.

NASA has 19 major Earth science missions flying on satellites and instruments mounted on the International Space Station. The space agency plans to launch about 20 Earth science missions between late 2016 to 2023, including small satellites, cubesats and space station instruments. "We will continue launching several missions per year on average," Freilich said. [50 Years of Presidential Visions for Space Exploration]

No Ordinary Time

NASA's Earth Science Division also is working with other U.S. government agencies to identify Earth-observation data they are interested in acquiring in 2017 through a new program, Interagency Satellite Needs-Collection Process, led by the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy.

"We have embraced that process," Freilich said, noting that agencies have submitted requests for 77 data products that NASA might be able to obtain from Earth-observation satellites. "Perhaps subtle changes to our programs could address the needs of other federal agencies," Freilich said. "In a time of transition, demonstrating that we do support other agencies is of paramount importance."

That type of comment was a clear indication that this was no ordinary town hall, which traditionally is a relatively well-attended meeting of scientists keeping tabs on NASA's Earth science portfolio. This year, many scientists claimed seats in the meeting room before the previous session ended. By the time Freilich began to speak, every seat was filled and latecomers lined the walls. [In Photos: NASA's 16 Best Earth Photos from Space by Astronauts]

Scientists in the room clearly recognize their work could be affected by the incoming administration, which includes cabinet nominees skeptical of climate change and a space policy adviser, Robert Walker, former chairman of the U.S. House of Representatives Science Committee, who has publicly questioned the value of NASA's Earth science work.

While NASA officials did not mention any names or specific threats to the future of the agency's Earth science program, Zurbuchen preached unity. "United communities are a lot harder to beat," he said Dec. 13, during NASA's Planetary Science Town Hall. "Lets stick together and stick up for each other. Together our narrative is a lot stronger than any small narrative any one of us could come up with in a small segment of the community."

Since it is not clear how NASA programs will fare in the coming years, it is natural for scientists to feel worried, Zurbuchen said. Nevertheless, he is operating under the assumption that "when everything is said and done, we will have a community that does Earth science."

"Earth is a planet that is worthy of scientific investigation and discovery," Zurbuchen said. "The research not only teach us about nature, but it also affects our lives directly on a daily timescale, a yearly timescale or beyond."

NASA's Earth science research also ties in with much of the agency's other work. "When we are thinking about other planets or the early solar system, the Earth is an important part," Zurbuchen said. "The instruments that we are flying elsewhere were invented to look at the Earth first."

Instead of speaking in general terms about the benefits of NASA's Earth science program, Zurbuchen told scientists to point to concrete contributions of their work. On Nov. 29, for example, Louisiana experienced severe thunderstorms and tornadoes while wildfires broke out in Tennessee. Space-based sensors developed by NASA helped firefighters battle the Tennessee blazes and assisted forecasters in Louisiana.

Pointing to that type of vivid example helps people understand the value of Earth science instruments such as the the Geostationary Lightning Mapper developed by NASA and flying on the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite-R. "That instrument is on that GOES-R spacecraft because NASA invests in these kinds of instruments and matures them until the day when they change our lives," Zurbuchen said.

Zurbuchen told SpaceNews that his emphasis on making NASA's scientific work concrete is not a reaction to the changing presidential administration, but rather a reflection of his background.

Before becoming NASA's associate administrator for science, Zurbuchen was a scientist whose research focused largely on solar and heliospheric physics. As a professor at the University of Michigan, he also established the Center for Entrepreneurship in the College of Engineering.

Entrepreneurs focus on solving a problem for a community in a way that changes lives, Zurbuchen said. When he looks at NASA programs, Zurbuchen said he wants to see the data showing how the agency's work is solving programs for farmers or helping other groups.

"That's how I look at the world," he said.

This story was provided by SpaceNews, dedicated to covering all aspects of the space industry.

{ http://www.space.com/ }

UFO first contact in 2017 3rd of January NewVIDEO!

(Before It's News)

Corpuscular ship is constructed in detail in accordance with the law of God in the form of light energy. Light corpuscular ship is therefore better as a spiritual power manifested corpuscular ships. The ship can move faster than light. When the object moves faster than light, disappearing from sight. Goes into another dimension.

The human eye sees everything that is inside of the light spectrum. When I mention the light spectrum and hit the light spectrum of the sun. With increased intensity of light would blind man. His senses would not notice a higher form of vibration. It can not therefore see the world resulting on a different frequency, although located around beside him. Corpuscular ship can move at high speed. It is therefore invisible to the human eye. By increasing the energy of the corpuscular vessel there is an increase of its speed. If it goes into the vessel by its frequency, it means that moves slower than the maximum speed. This makes it the human eye sees. It manifests itself in the form of light. Reducing the speed to changing light and the human eye, the ship must appear as a solid object. If the moving ship and if it stays on the molecular level, the maximum rate will remain invisible to the human eye. That they are explained in words that corpuscular ship may be the front door of your house and you will not see it. The ship can come to a man secretly. People of it may remain hidden from man.

The people of the corpuscular vessels reduces its frequency to a protein molecule in the cell become visible to the human eye. They therefore come secretly and suddenly appear before you in the form of light and energy. At that moment comes the light source, the energy in the form of spirit. You will be influenced by your spirit will be affected the most energy, which manifested itself around you and you will be allowed contact with corpuscular ships. In contact with them you should not worry. Believe me, it’s something natural. There is nothing mysterious. Only one who manifests the spirit of mentally able to take this energy will be able to experience the transition from one age to another.

{ http://beforeitsnews.com/ }

Vlaming meldt minder UFO’s

UFO-meldpunt kon drie meldingen niet verklaren, vrouw zorgt voor merkwaardigste waarneming van 2016

FOTO: BELGISCH UFO-MELDPUNT

Uit het verslag kan opgemaakt worden dat de meeste meldingen binnenlopen in de maand januari. “Vermoedelijk is de media-aandacht die gegenereerd werd door de publicatie van het vorige jaarverslag, hier verantwoordelijk voor”, zo stipt het verslag aan. Ook in de zomermaanden juli en augustus werden meer UFO’s waargenomen, “wellicht door het mooie weer in die maanden”.

De 143 waarnemingen, het laagste aantal sinds 2008, van het UFO-Meldpunt zijn waarnemingen in Vlaanderen, want daarnaast is er nog een ander centrum, het Comité Belge pour l’Etude des Phénomènes Spatiaux (COBEPS), dat meldingen in Franstalig België registreert. Zij noteerden 74 meldingen voor 2016 (in 2015 waren dat er 93). Wat de 143 Vlaamse meldingen betreft, kwamen de meeste uit de provincies Oost-Vlaanderen (33) en Antwerpen (30). De stad Antwerpen leidt de dans met 7 meldingen.

Nieuwe methode

De aanzienlijke daling van het aantal meldingen uit Vlaanderen is naar alle waarschijnlijkheid voor een deel veroorzaakt door het feit dat het UFO-meldpunt sinds februari 2016 een nieuwe werkmethodiek hanteert. Aan de waarnemer wordt voortaan gevraagd om bij voorkeur enkel nog verschijnselen te melden waarvan de waarschijnlijke verklaring niet terug te vinden is op de internetpagina “verklaringen” van het meldpunt.

Waarnemingen krijgen de status van “hoge vreemdheid” toebedeeld, wanneer ze aan bepaalde criteria voldoen. Hoewel de getuigen aangespoord werden om hun meldingen zo gedetailleerd mogelijk te beschrijven, kreeg het grootste deel (51 meldingen) van de binnengekomen waarnemingen “gegevens onvoldoende” als evaluatie. Deze meldingen bevatten voor het meldpunt te weinig bruikbare gegevens om een eventuele verklaring te kunnen geven of een verder onderzoek te starten.

Bij de verklaringen voor de beschreven en vaak ook gefotografeerde of gefilmde “niet geïdentificeerde vliegende voorwerpen” noemt het Belgisch UFO-meldpunt in zijn jaarverslag onder meer “meteoren of ruimteschroot, ballonnen, satellieten (inclusief ISS), vliegtuigen en helikopters, vogels en drones”. Het laat zich aanzien dat vooral laatstgenoemde verklaringsgrond de komende jaren nog in aantal zal toenemen.

“Niet verklaard”

Wie bovenstaande grafiek goed bekeken heeft, ziet dat er drie UFO-meldingen het label “niet verklaard” kregen. Het meldpunt vond het noodzakelijk om twee van die meldingen onder de loep te nemen.

25 januari - Wachtebeke: “Een schijf met bovenaan een uitsteeksel”

Het meldpunt ging eerst uit van de “meest voor de hand liggende verklaring voor deze waarneming”: een drone. Daarna rees er echter twijfel. “Drones zijn in de omgeving van de waarnemingsplaats verboden”. En: “De grootte van het object op de ontvangen schets is veel te groot voor een drone”.

De omstandigheden van de waarnemingen waren allesbehalve ideaal. De melder reed namelijk met de wagen. Toch stelt het meldpunt vast dat “een foute inschatting onwaarschijnlijk is aangezien de waarneemster het object vanuit verschillende hoeken zowel voor als achter een bomenrij waarnam”. Het is ook onwaarschijnlijk dat één of meerdere helder verlichte landbouwvoertuigen verantwoordelijk waren voor het verschijnsel.

En dus is de conclusie: “De korte waarnemingsduur, de duisternis en het feit dat de getuige zich in een rijdend voertuig bevond, zijn er de oorzaak van dat er geen gedetailleerdere beschrijving van het object kon worden gegeven. Tevens wordt de waarneming van Mevr. E. D. D. niet bevestigd door andere onafhankelijke getuigenissen. Evaluatie: niet verklaard”.

27 juni - Lembeke: “Voorwerp met twee felle lichten en knipperlichtjes”

Het meldpunt wijst deze keer de melder op de aanwezigheid van een Boeing 737 komende van Oostende op 3km hoogte en op weg om te landen in Zaventem. “Er was aanvankelijk weinig twijfel dat deze Boeing het object was geweest dat de melder die nacht had waargenomen.”

De getuige leverde echter bijkomend ‘bewijsmateriaal’ aan en kon niet geloven dat hij slechts een vliegtuig had gezien. “De aangeleverde extra details sluiten de vliegtuighypothese niet uit, gezien de gekende moeilijkheid om in het donker vormen en vooral afstanden juist te kunnen beoordelen”, aldus het meldpunt.

En dus wordt er geconcludeerd: “Er waren geen andere getuigen van deze gebeurtenis, zodat het niet goed mogelijk is om uit de beschikbare informatie een overtuigende conclusie te trekken. Evaluatie: niet verklaard, mogelijk vliegtuig”.

“Twee vreemde wezens”

De meest merkwaardige melding kwam echter van een vrouw uit Zoutleeuw. Op 23 mei zag ze naar eigen zeggen “twee vreemde wezens”. Ze beschreef haar waarneming in een gedetailleerde mail:

Het meldpunt vond vrij snel een verklaring. “Deze bijzondere vorm van zinsbegoocheling die optreedt net voor het ontwaken, staat in de klinische psychologie bekend als een hypnopompische hallucinatie. Precies omdat deze ‘dromen’ zich afspelen in een half wakkere toestand zijn de beelden bijzonder levendig. In de UFO-literatuur worden deze slaapkamerverschijningen vaak aangeduid als bedroom invaders”.

Het is nu afwachten wat 2017 zal brengen op het vlak van UFO-waarnemingen...

MY HYPOTHESIS OF THE UFO PHENOMENON

3 Alien Skulls Found In Antarctica By Smithsonian?!

Mystery History

{ https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCC9JHVPm-4P5QDp9vk8EH-A }

Australian Team has Discovered a Colorful Wonderland Beneath the Antarctic Ice

By: Nidhi Goyal 

Image courtesy Australian Antarctic Division

What Is the Likelihood That Europa’s Oceans Harbor Alien Life? We May Soon Find Out.

 

An artist's concept of water plumes erupting from the icy surface of Jupiter's moon Europa.

G. Bacon (STScI)

IN BRIEF

• Most enthusiasm in exoplanet searches is reserved for so-called "Earth-like" planets —approximately Earth-sized worlds within their star's habitable zone.
• But speculation about the life-bearing potential of some of the icy moons of the outer planets may help broaden this narrow, provincial outlook; and proposed missions to Jupiter's moon Europa aim to answer the question of whether there might be life beneath its icy mantle.

DEFINING THE HABITABLE ZONE

It’s one of the most pressing questions in science: is there alien life somewhere out there within the great wide demesnes of the universe—beyond the homely, terrestrial sort that we’re all familiar with?

We’re still searching for the answer, but it seems that each day brings word of some new exoplanetary discovery that may at last resolve the issue—our technology has evolved to the point where we can now detect Earth-sized (note the distinction between “Earth-sized” and “Earth-like”) exoplanets residing in the habitable zones of their parent stars.

But are we restricting ourselves—unnecessarily—with the fetters of a geocentric prejudice? The circumstellar habitable zone (HZ) merely represents that part of a planetary system where temperatures are conducive to the existence of liquid water—in other words, precisely where the Earth currently resides in the Solar System. Certainly, with everything being equal, a planet with these conditions in a star’s HZ would be habitable to terrestrial life as we know it—but whoever said that’s all we’re looking for? Furthermore, we know that the HZ isn’t static in time; as a main sequence star evolves, its temperature increases, and the zone of habitability sweeps further outward—which is something to consider for highly-evolved, red giant stars, as a recent study has shown.

The Sun’s habitable zone, as it is today (top); the habitable zone as it will be in about 7 billion years (bottom). Credit: Wendy Kenigsberg/Cornell University

Putting aside the question of completely alien life, founded upon chemical organizations radically unlike anything we know, it’s not even clear that terrestrial-type life could only evolve upon an Earth-like planet within its star’s HZ. That’s where studying the icy moons of Jupiter and Saturn becomes important.

Ever since the Voyager probes winged their way galaxy-ward, there’s been a great deal of speculation that Jupiter’s second moon, Europa, might harbor a warm, liquid ocean beneath its piebald shell of red-and-white ice; recent observations with the Hubble Space Telescope even suggest some of that water is escaping into space, in the form of geysers—akin to what we see on Saturn’s moon Enceladus.

THE ICE-COVERED OCEAN

The existence of such an ocean on Europa is attributable to the intricate celestial mechanics of the Galilean Moons; this remarkable dance—choreographed across billions of years between Io, Ganymede, Europa and the prodigious mass of Jupiter—has squeezed and warmed Europa’s mysterious innards through the action of tidal flexure. It’s a bit like what’s happened to twisted, volcanic little Io—only with a far happier and less Dantean result.

Now, it doesn’t necessarily follow that a motley assortment of marine monsters has evolved in Europa’s putative subglacial world-ocean—though we all prefer to believe that’s exactly the case. But there’s certainly reason enough to be hopeful.

Europa, the mysterious moon of Jupiter. Is there alien life lurking beneath all of that ice? (Credit: NASA)

Life on Earth, for instance, needs water and a source of energy—the Sun, in most cases. But it’s also true that certain organisms, particularly in the deep oceans, derive their energy from purely non-solar sources; it’s even possible that the earliest life on Earth was of just such a type, at a time when the Sun’s radiation was far weaker than it is today.

A recent study has shown that an exothermic chemical reaction known as “serpentinization,” whereby saltwater reacts with rocky minerals to produce heat and hydrogen, may be as common on Europa as in terrestrial oceans. Furthermore, the blistering radiation of Jupiter may be enough to separate oxygen atoms from water molecules in the moon’s icy mantle, with the oxygen then cycling deep into the interior. If correct, it means all the ingredients for a thriving ecosystem are theoretically in place; all that’s needed is the spark of life—unfortunately, ascertaining the likelihood of that happening is beyond our statistical models.

But plans are already afoot to loft a space probe toward distant Europa, this time equipped with a chemical tongue so the probe can pass through any water ice geysers the moon is discharging and “taste” the composition of its inner ocean.

“Observations of Europa have provided us with tantalizing clues over the last two decades, and the time has come to seek answers to one of humanity’s most profound questions,” says John Grunsfeld, associate administrator of NASA’s Science Mission Directorate.

Regardless of what the probe discovers, it’s about time we start expanding our definition of what the “habitable zone” really means—in our own Solar System, as in the myriad exoplanetary systems swimming daily within our ken.

References:

•  Space.com, 
• NASA's Mission to Europa, 
• Cornell University

{ https://futurism.com/ }

The Biggest Conspiracy Theory of All Time-Stargate at the Gulf of Aden