Satellite to Probe Earthly Anomaly

Space.com; Aug. 23, 2001; Planet Earth: "Satellites Search for Ancient Artifact"

Declassified U.S. Air Force image of the "anomaly" taken June 19, 1949. Anomalous structures called "prongs" are indicated.

Seems like a story for the "X-Files". A 1949 photographic recognizance flight near the western Iranian border images an anomalous object 4,725-meters up the side of a mountain. It is partly buried in snow and enormous: at 183-meters, it is two football fields long. The image is kept classified for decades. U.S. intelligence assets again image the anomaly with spy satellites in 1973 and 1976. Imaging experts can't decide if it is a strange rock formation or something else.

Then a high-profile celebrity becomes involved. James B. Irwin, an Apollo 15 moonwalker, leads six expeditions to the mountain to examine the anomaly. Each time he was unable to locate it. His final attempt in 1990 led to detention on spying allegations. Since 1991, military operations against Kurdish rebels in the area preclude more organized forays up the mountain.

In 1993 Porcher Taylor, an expert on satellite imagery and professor at the University of Richmond, Virginia, begins to gather information about the anomaly. He was able to convince Insight Magazine to fund 1-meter resolution satellite images of the object in 1999 and 2000. A seven-member team analyzed the images and compared them to the now declassified 1949 photos. The team was split on a conclusion: some saw the anomaly as human-made, while others thought it was rock, and others felt the data was inconclusive.

So where and what is this anomaly? It is on the Northwestern Plateau of 5,137-meter tall Mount Ararat in eastern Turkey. Imaging experts use the bland and academic sounding designation "Ararat Anomaly" when discussing it. But some that have studied the images have a better name for it: Noah's ark! Could it really be the Biblical ark that carried Noah, his family, and menagerie of animals on the waters of a flooded Earth?

According to professor Taylor, arguments have existed for decades within the intelligence community regarding the nature of the anomaly: "Debates center on whether or not it's a strange rock formation, a crashed airplane, perhaps a fortress or some other structure hundreds of years old … or maybe something more interesting of potentially biblical proportions." Some see the bow of a ship sticking out of a glacier, the ribs and the keel plainly evident. One member of the team that carried out the recent analysis concluded that the anomaly had shifted position and therefore was not part of the mountain.

New information from the world's highest-resolution commercial satellite may resolve the issue. A half-meter resolution commercial imaging satellite, known as QuickBird 2, will be lofted by EarthWatch Inc this October. Taylor convinced EarthWatch to image the area of interest. EarthWatch is not yet sure when the imaging will be worked into the observing program.

With winter approaching the best bet is to take the images as soon as possible before snow and cloud cover hinders the search.

Looking at the Moon - I 

CSIRO; Aug. 21, 2001; Press Release: "Looking to the Moon for Better Satellite Images"

Moon over Earth from Japanese weather satellite -- Australian Bureau of Meteorology

Australian and US scientists are working on a method of calibrating weather imaging satellites by using the Moon. The Australian Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO) and US Geological Survey jointly developed the technique.

Satellites had previously used the clouds and deserts of Earth as calibration points, but atmosphere, weather, and seasonal changes affect their appearance. The Moon is an ideal calibration target because its surface morphology and color is very static. But like on Earth, the brightness of an area changes with the angle formed by the Sun, Moon, and satellite.

That's where the US Geological Survey's mapping of lunar brightness at various Sun angles comes in. When a satellite forms an angle with the Sun and Moon that matches a calibration point from the Survey's data, the satellite sensor is trained on the Moon and calibrated. More work is being done to expand the range of calibration points.

Using this technique will make data collected by satellite platforms more consistent and provide better information on climate, pollution, and forest fires.

Looking at the Moon - II

Sky & Telescope, Oct. 2001, New Notes: "Moon Sheds Light on Earth's Climate"

1994 Clementine spacecraft image of Moon. Venus shines above as the solar corona peaks over a limb. The surface of the Moon is illuminated by earthshine. NASA/USGS

We've all seen the crescent Moon low on the horizon, hanging brilliantly on one side of a full, dimly-lit, lunar disk. This phenomenon occurs for a few days before and after new Moon; you may have heard of this sight referred to as seeing "the old Moon in the new Moon's arms." It's the only time besides the full phase (and in eclipse) when you can see the full disk of the Moon. At the time of crescent phase, the Sun, Moon, and Earth -- in that order -- almost form a straight line. From all parts of the Moon, the Earth appears almost full and bathes the lunar surface with earthshine -- just as the Moon around full illuminates the Earth.

An old idea to monitor earthshine on the Moon has been revived. Since earthshine is just sunlight reflected off the Earth's land, sea, and cloud forms, it indicates the albedo (reflectivity) of the Earth. This can be used to calculate the amount of solar radiation absorbed by the Earth -- a key factor in any climate change scenario. French astronomer Andre Danjon carried out earthshine observations of the Moon in the early part of the 20th century. Currently a 6-inch refractor at Big Bear Solar Observatory in California is being employed for a similar study. This study uses CCD camera technology and satellite imagery of the Earth to look for long and short-term albedo differences.

The current findings are that the Earth reflects about 30% of incident sunshine. This varies by 5% daily and 20% seasonally. Over the last 5-years a 2.5% drop in albedo has been noted. More data over time will have to be gathered to see if this trend continues before any climatological conclusion can be reached.

Publishers May Need to Revise all Physics Textbooks?

Space.com; Aug. 15, 2001; General Science: "Speed of Light, Other Constants May Change" 

AIP.org; Aug. 20, 2001; Physics News Update: "Is Alpha, like Pi, a Fundamental Constant?"

Press for value.

Observations of gas clouds in front of distant quasars may force fundamental changes in theories of physics and cosmology -- just as relativity and quantum mechanics did a hundred years ago. Quasars are brilliant, distant objects whose light can take billions of years to reach Earth -- and thus bring us information on conditions in the distant past of the Universe.

A team headed by a group from the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia, used the Keck Telescope in Hawaii to study spectral absorption line pairs from quasar light passing though foreground gas clouds. Atoms in the gas absorb specific wavelengths of the quasar light -- resulting in dark lines on the spectrograph. Spacing between the pairs is proportional to the square of the fine structure constant -- symbolized in equations by the Greek letter alpha. Alpha represents the strength of the electromagnetic force that bounds electrons to their atoms. Thus it is used to predict what wavelength of light an atom may absorb or emit. Absorption spectra was taken for quasars at various distances from Earth.

The researchers found, to a level of 1 part in 100,000, that alpha was larger for quasars closer to Earth. Since further quasar distance correlates to longer travel time since the light passed through the gas clouds, it means that a fundamental constant of nature is increasing as the Universe ages.

Alpha is a dimensionless constant approximately equal to 0.00729735 -- not a very interesting number to look at. But, alpha is really a convenient grouping of a "who's who" of physics constants that show up together in a certain relation. The fundamental physics constants the make up alpha are: the speed of light, the charge of the electron, the permittivity of vacuum, and Planck's constant. (Pi is also a part of alpha, in the form of the permeability of vacuum, but is not expected to change!). Researchers do not know if some or all of these physics constants are changing with time. All they know is that if alpha is increasing, atoms are getting "stronger" with time.

"A variation of the fine structure constant would force a revision of the so-called standard model in particle physics," said astrophysicist Massimo Stiavelli, of the Space Telescope Science Institute. The "standard model" was thought to explain all phenomena in the present and past of the Universe. Having withstood testing over the decades, any new theory that explains a changing alpha would have to incorporate the standard model.