POSTED 14.11.2018
A SOLAR SAIL ?
Was the first object to be seen entering the orbit of our planets last October an alien craft or just one of thousands of meteorites bombarding interstellar space?
Since the mysterious object Oumuamua appeared between Earth and the Sun, the SETI Institute (Search for Extra – Terrestrial Intelligence) has been monitoring it with its high powered telescopes in California.
Two days ago Harvard astronomers concluded that the cigar shaped object named after the Hawaiian word for “messenger” where it was first observed “may be a fully operational probe..sent to Earth’s vicinity by an alien
civilisation.”
Chairman of the Harvard Astronomy Department, Professor Avi Loeb added:
“There is data on the orbit of this object for which there is no other explanation.”
Estimated at up to half a mile in length and one tenth of this in diameter it was travelling so fast at 196,000 mph
that it was propelled away from the gravity of the sun.
Physicists concluded that its huge acceleration untouched by gravity could be powered by solar radiation.
It followed a theory that very bright fast radio bursts could be from solar powered planet sized transmitters from distant galaxies billions of light years away.
The mysterious object was also unusually bright without the dust that is usually emitted from comets.
Two years ago a project called Breakthrough Starshot was announced by physicist Stephen Hawking and entrepreneur
Yuri Milner. With the help of Nasa it plans to send probes propelled by light to planets outside our solar system.
Were the “mysterious bright lights” seen by three different pilots on the 9th November last also some remnants from
outer space debris or alien probes? It remains to be seen what Irish Aviation officials will make of the UFO sightings.
Nasa’s space probes, Pioneer 10 and 11 and Voyager 1 and 2 have been sending mind blowing data back to earth since the 1970s while travelling at a speed of 6.2 miles (10 kms) a second.
Imagine what Breakthrough Starshot will find when its light propelled probes speed through space at 20 per cent the speed of light or 37,200 miles a second (speed of light being 186,000 miles a second).
With Earth travelling 1.5 million miles a day around the Sun it’s enough to make your head spin.
www.theguardian.com 12 April 2016 Stephen Hawking and Juri Miner launch $100 m star voyage
Copyright Mica Jay