The U.S. Department of Defense has confirmed the work of two researchers after a meteorite fell off the coast of Papua New Guinea.
A galaxy journey that ended on a blue planet. Researchers who joined the U.S. military have discovered that the meteorite that struck Earth a few years ago came from another solar system. CNN.
The object, scientifically known as CNEOS 2014-01-08, crashed on January 8, 2014 off the northeast coast of Papua New Guinea. This is a surprising discovery for Amir Siraj, who discovered the meteorite in 2019 as an interstellar meteorite. Co-authored with Abraham Loeb, another Harvard University researcher.
An object can move at a speed of 60 kilometers per second
With a diameter of about 45 centimeters, this object passed the solar system at a considerable speed of 60 kilometers per second. With so much speed, the researchers wanted to reverse the meteorite’s orbit and find that it did not orbit the sun, but came from outside our solar system.
“It may have been created by another star and may have been ejected from the same star system and collided with Earth before coming to our solar system,” Amir Siraj explains.
Research confirmed by the Department of Defense
The research conducted by the two from NASA’s database was never published, which did not publish all the information needed to publish it in a scientific journal.
Most recently, officials confirmed that the estimated speed of the meteorite was “accurate enough to mark a galaxy’s orbit”, according to a U.S. Department of Defense report.
“I thought we would never know the true nature of this meteorite. […] It was an incredible moment for me to see this letter from the Department of Defense with my own eyes, ”Amir Siraj told CNN.
However, the researcher does not want to stop there and hopes to lead a team to find part of this meteorite in the depths of the Pacific Ocean. A project that Aamir Siraj knew was crazy did not stop him from thinking that by discovering this meteorite we could better know what is beyond our solar system.
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