In January 2014, a meteor fell off the coast of Papua New Guinea, leading to speculation by Avi Loeb from Harvard that the remains on the ocean floor could be of extraterrestrial origin. However, Benjamin Fernando from Johns Hopkins University, a planetary seismologist, and his team re-examined the seismic data and found that it was not evidence of extraterrestrial activity but likely caused by an ordinary truck on the island.
During an interview with The New York Times, Dr. Fernando explained that the initial confusion arose because the Loeb team may have misunderstood the seismic data and mistook signals from passing trucks on the island for a meteor. Dr. Fernando’s team found similar signals on seismometers occurring during daytime hours, indicating human-generated noise.
Ultimately, the conclusion was that the debris found on the ocean floor was likely not from a meteor but possibly just earthly material or a small piece of the large number of meteorites that fall to Earth annually. Therefore, there is no need to be concerned about aliens invading hospitals or any extraterrestrial origin of the material recovered.
The lesson learned from this incident is the importance of consulting with experts in the relevant field before making speculative claims based on scientific data. Additionally, this situation highlights the need for scientific rigor and thorough analysis to prevent sensationalism and wild speculation in the scientific community.
Source
Photo credit www.nytimes.com
