8 years ago, the first interstellar meteorite fell to Earth: scientists figured out where to look for it

Amir Siraj and Harvard's Avi Loeb from Harvard University, who were the first to declare interstellar nature

meteor CNEOS dated January 08, 2014, developed a plan to search for its fragments. To do this, they teamed up with an ocean technology consulting company.

Most of the meteorite would have burned up during it.descent into the Earth's atmosphere, likely leaving only fragments scattered on the ocean floor. However, satellite data combined with data on wind and ocean currents will reduce the search area to an area of ​​10x10 km. 

Scientists assume that the fragments willmagnetized. If the ship were equipped with a large magnet, it could potentially collect tiny meteorite fragments from the ocean floor. Siraj and Loeb developed a search plan and teamed up with an ocean technology consulting company.

In 2014, a meteorite about half a meter longfell into the ocean off the coast of Papua New Guinea. The data indicated that it was an interstellar space rock. If the information is confirmed, then it is only the third known object of this type - after Oumuamua and Comet Borisov. And also the first one to reach Earth. Starting an underwater expedition to find it is not easy, but it’s worth it, scientists are sure.

Potential interstellar origin of the objectIt was first recognized by then graduate student Amir Siraj and Harvard professor Avi Loeb. Using catalog data on the object's trajectory, they came to the conclusion that the meteorite could have been located outside our solar system. This is due to its unusually high heliocentric speed.

However, there is a problem.The data used to measure the object's impact with the Earth came from a US Department of Defense spy satellite. Thus, the exact values ​​of the measurement error are a closely guarded secret - the military fears that their satellite's capabilities will then become public information. But without these details, most of the scientific community is understandably still reluctant to officially classify CNEOS as an interstellar object. As a result, Siraj and Loeb's paper remains unpublished because it has not yet been peer-reviewed.

Their statement, however, was backed up in April 2022.U.S. Space Force Space Operations Command chief scientist Joel Moser reviewed the classified data and confirmed that the velocity estimate provided by NASA is accurate enough to indicate an interstellar trajectory.

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