In 2014, some sound waves were detected and were believed to come from a meteor entering the atmosphere of the Earth. This meteor is speculated to have come from interstellar space. However, new findings suggest that this may not have been the case at all.
Signals Thought To Have Alien Origins
The notion that the meteor could have had alien origins and could have been from interstellar space blossomed further after materials were sourced from the ocean last year. This is near where the meteor was believed to have crashed at Papua New Guinea's north.
Now, according to a new study that will be presented during the Lunar and Planetary Science Conference in Texas, these signals that were believed to be from a meteor may have just been caused by a truck driving nearby.
Sounds of a Truck
Planetary seismologist Benjamin Fernando from Johns Hopkins University shares that over time, the signal altered its directions. It precisely matched a road that runs past the seismometer.
Fernando explains that it is hard to catch a signal and be able to confirm that it is not from a specific thing. Nevertheless, what they can show is that there are several similar signals and that these all share similar characteristics expected from a truck and none that can be expected from a meteor.
As for the previously speculated meteor, it is thought that it entered the Earth's atmosphere from another location. Fernando explains that the location of the fireball was actually extremely far from where the oceanographic expedition ventured to for the meteor fragment retrieval. They did not just use the wrong signal; they also searched in the wrong area.
Based on the new study, the meteor could have gone into the atmosphere roughly 100 miles away from the area where it was thought to have arrived.
A 2023 preprint study, which has not undergone peer review, suggests that the discovered materials came from the meteor and had an interstellar source. Such assumptions surfaced from the high recorded speed of the meteor as it arrived on Earth.
The authors note that the speed of the object, relative to the Milky Way galaxy's Local Standard of Rest, was higher than 95% of the stars within the vicinity of the Sun. They also note that the US Space Command sent a formal letter to NASA in 2022 that notes a 99.99% likelihood that the object had an interstellar source.
However, the new research completely discredits such a theory regarding the seismic signals' origins. The authors of the new study suggest that the materials that were discovered on the seafloor were smaller meteorites from earlier impacts or particles from other meteorites that hit the surface of the Earth. Fernando explains that what was found on the ocean floor is fully unrelated to the meteor.
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