The Death Planets

Regardless of the money spent by agencies such as NASA and SETI who feel assured that sooner or later man will make contact with an extraterrestrial civilization it seems there have been no results from our methodical search via satellites and telescope monitoring. For some reason it seems that our costly attempts at trying to find planets that give off intelligent signals or some indicators of artificial energy production, nothing has materialized. Two constellations suspected of having been origins of intruders in our world such as the abductions of Barney Hill and his wife, Betty, who identified Zeta Reticuli before astronomers ever discovered it, or Vega which has emitted seemingly intelligent signals, nothing has been convincingly proven. Though we now know just how much science has been politicized, still the standard for proof is a continued repeat or reproducible observation in order to validate an action or event.

Nobody there?

Instead, what NASA’s special detection satellites have only found planets that are not only lifeless but extremely hostile to any life form we know of on our planet? The very rare possibility of finding the “Goldie Locks” zone of planets life that would been in an orbit not too close to the heat of a star, not too far away that they would be too frigid, and having a companion star that does not wreak havoc with deadly gamma rays has yielded some results but without evidence of life. The vast majority of indicators tells us that most planets have weather that would destroy earth based life as well as a satellite or landing craft.

Wrong guess?

Things NASA has learned that proved their assumptions wrong have been numerous. This tells us that though the molecular and atomic structure of the universe may be consistent as Einstein proved, that is just about the only thing NASA was correct about. One of their biggest assumptions were that most solar systems would probably be like ours. The small yellow dwarf we know as “Sol”. Our nearest companion Proxima Centauri. With only 1/8 the mass of our sun is a red dwarf and thought to be part of a triple star system in Alpha Centauri. At 4.22 light years from our sun, still that is a great distance. Our satellites have probed hundreds of light years into the universe and it appears nothing even in the remote regions appears promising.

Oblivious?

This indicates 2 possibilities. Either, we (The Human race) are so primitive that we cannot detect the advanced signs of intelligent signals because their form of transmission is so different than ours and we are attempting to detect by very obsolete methods. Or, number 2-whatever visitations we have deemed UFO’s from other planets have visited us through interdimensional travel or wormholes. These forms of propulsion are not well known, theorized, or understood. Unless there are ultra-secret programs that are suspected by conspiracy theorists it appears we may very well be alone in a vast universe of hostile planets or rare uninhabited planets that would be Earth-like.

Never the twain shall meet

Many scientists have speculated that any civilization that had even a billion more years head start of development over humans might be so far advanced in comparison to us that an analogy might illustrate the disparity similar to a human researcher attempting to communicate with a paramecium, a very primitive cellular life form. Reflecting on the inherent destructive nature of the human race one might wonder just how primitive we would seem to another more advanced species. We would most likely feel ashamed! Just remember that almost every scientific theory proven correct or every technological advancement considered to be impossible was first conceived of in science fiction. So, at least, we, as a species, can visualize where the future might take mankind. We might even be able to manifest our future ourselves through visionary creation.

The opposite way!

Things that NASA was completely wrong about were such assumptions as gas giants such as Jupiter, Neptune, and Uranus were thought be likely positioned in other distant solar systems as in ours with the larger planets located further from their suns in orbit. In actuality there are many alien planetary systems where the larger planets are the ones closest to their sun and rather than being gas giants they would have a solid metallic core like the rocky planets in our solar system located closer as opposed to the distant frozen gas giants. This caught NASA quite by surprise.

Foreign planetary arrangements

Scientists had no idea just how hostile the conditions on a distant planet light years away could be until one celestial body was measured as having 3,500 mph. planetary winds in a noxious frozen atmosphere. Another thing NASA was mistaken about was the numerous occurrence of binary star systems where a dual partnership of two gravitationally attracted stars actually form a solar system that is battered by the opposing tidal effect of two different stars. They have even discovered triple star systems each bound by the other’s gravitational field. In many cases one companion star has a stronger gravitation pull that begins to wrest material away from the weaker star to be consumed by its celestial companion.

LGM’s

Many pulsars (stars that have imploded and compacted) having such a powerful magnetic pull that light can barely escape them with a single rotation pulse. Each pulse may emit X-rays or Gamma rays that will strike and pummel any unfortunate planets that are orbiting them! So a beam of deadly radiation regularly bombards the surface of each member of that solar system. There would be little if any possibility of life on these “Death Planets” or as we know it. These stars rapidly rotate and emit a timely pulse that scientists excitedly considered they were receiving the first intelligent signals ever encountered from the universe before they discovered the true source of that signal simply being a pulsar! They were nicknamed laughingly (“LGM’s) little green men.

Knock knock who’s there?

Life as we know it on Earth is carbon based. Our molecular make up is primarily the carbon molecule chain, yet scientists speculate that life could evolve around the silicon based composition as well. It would obviously greatly differ from us, and would probably stand up to hot and cold extremes much more resiliently than life as we have observed. The question is, would we be able to detect that biological signal given off with the instrumentality we are now using? Former NASA archaeologist Farouk El Baz once speculated that our distant exploration satellites might land on or orbit around alien planets completely oblivious to the existence of life forms due to the ineffective instrumentality-asking the wrong questions or not being able to recognize the differing geometry of alien housing structures.

Could this be the case?

At a Crash Retrieval UFO conference in Las Vegas that I attended, physicist Stanton Friedman made some very interesting points in his speech opening the convention. He made a historical analogy. When Germany began its devastating aerial assault over London and Great Britain in 1940 their reconnaissance aircraft scanned the topography of the Island for potential threats to their Luftwaffe. Some people have asked why the Germans did not find the huge radar masts situated over the Cliffs of Dover as they flew from across the English Channel. It was radar scanning that would eventually defeat the German air crews on their bombing mission as the British knew when they were coming and could anticipate their approach. This led to unsustainable attrition that forced the Germans to terminate their campaign. According to Stanton Friedman, the German’s were only visually scanning and using radio guidance. They had no idea of the radar masts that were bouncing microwaves off their bombing fleet. This is how one civilization might completely miss the presence of another. They simply did not know what to look for!

Colonizing Mars with Robots

Man has fantasized about landing on Mars and terraforming the Red Planet into another earth for decades. To some uniformed people you would get the impression that Mars would just be another vacation destination, but that’s where science fiction and reality begin to part ways. There are harsh realities and technical limitations that make feasibility a distant prospect even though Werner von Braun at NASA dreamed about it in his day.

Uninhabitable

For one thing Mars has a very hostile environment. Many people realize little that the Martian atmosphere is the equivalent of Earth’s at 30,000 feet where a person would soon suffocate and their blood would begin to boil in the lack of atmospheric pressure. Since Mars interior core became dormant unlike earth’s hot liquid metallic core that generates a magnetic field that forms a shield that protects Earth from the sun’s radiation, the Martian surface is bombarded by deadly radiation and meteors! Whereas Earth maintains a gravitational companion 1/6 of its size, Phobos, the only moon in the solar system traveling counter clockwise around Mars does not seem to shield the Red Planet too well from meteor strikes.

Unreal weather

Dust storms regularly scour the Mars surface at speeds of over 1,300 mph. with tornadoes that can range in length up to 150 miles and further into the upper atmosphere than those that occur on Earth. One Russian scientist proclaimed that the Mars moon, Phobos, must be a hollow, artificial, satellite due to its speed and peculiar retrograde orbit. With no surface water on Mars and only sparse underground sources of it, Mars appears to be a dead planet though some evidence of organic soil organisms may have been detected by NASA’s landed satellites beginning with the Viking series in the 1970’s.

Still too far away

Taking a trip to Mars from Earth from a chemically launched rocket with tons of heavy fuel and a human payload would take 7 to 9 months for the crew with untenable limitations on resources to keep life support systems functional for so long. Currently, an Earth spacecraft cannot attain sufficient velocity or be launched from the surface with enough capacity to keep a crew alive for 7 months of travel. The future is promising as scientists begin research on ion propulsion and photon rockets that will not attain meaningful thrust in the atmosphere under gravity but once in the vacuum of space free of gravity a spaceship can attain incredible speeds able to reach Mars from Earth in 30 days to perhaps hours! This technological leap will take years!

Planning ahead

 

However, the use of modular robots who can be utilized in a phased array could construct an entire site for human landing and habitation long before a visitation from human astronauts. A boxlike robot propelled by a single tire affixed with a number of power tools or specific instruments could work in tandem with a large number of other similar automatons and literally build a facility fit for human occupation thanks to preprogramming and site selection. With cameras, enough memory, and monitoring from earth the project would be safer, less costly, remotely controlled, and there could be numerous completed projects by the time Earthmen were ready to land from orbit and begin a Martian colony. Still the personnel would need to be shielded from radiation and the threat of meteor strikes would still exist. So, the prospects of a Martian colony would still remain risky unless subsurface existence was attainable.

Challenging conditions

With temperature deviations of winter weather at 195 degrees below zero to summer temperatures at 70 to a chilly night time freeze to 100 degrees below zero the contrasts would put a strain on materials from the expansion and contraction as well as the energy that would need to be generated for life support. Solar energy panels might power orbiting space stations and satellites, but not the facilities that would need to keep humans alive. Robots were preceded their human Colonists would not need these energy consuming accommodations but that won’t stop them from assembling modular buildings, storage facilities, and inflating a human habitat with sufficient pressurized atmosphere. The building material would correspond to the ability of the robots to interlock parts much like a child’s Lego set would be built. The robots would more resemble box-like vehicles than biped humanoid types.

The future

Estimates for an operation of landed and delivered robotic construction teams using cargo that has been orbited and landed on the Martian soil could be less than 20 years away, but the expense of such an industry would have to be left to private companies who can furnish the capital and generate funds from other operations or private investors. Whereas terraforming, attempting to alter the atmosphere, terrain, and modify a near lifeless planet into a functional biosphere would take much longer to create. The technology for such ambitious accomplishments, but who knows what new discoveries will suddenly push technology much further along. Couple all this with astronomers having to forecast the arrival of asteroids could also be another calculated risk that would make a Martian Colony a costly gamble.

 

 

 

 

The Legend of the Lost Cosmonauts

 

As early as 1959 there were rumors that the Soviet space program had been not only too ambitious but also reckless in trying to maintain a technical edge over the NASA space program. By 1957 they had already launched the Sputnik orbital satellite and had beaten the Americans into space, but even before that the Russians were launching dogs, monkeys, and other animals into space to see if they could survive suborbital flight. After World War II and the beginning of the “Cold War” a number of Russians fled their country and were able to immigrate to the US. After what they had seen in their country under Stalin they had little trust in whatever their nation’s programs were doing and even less faith in their government’s concern over the lives of their Cosmonauts. When the Americans quickly followed with the launch of their own “Vanguard” orbital satellite, this only hastened the Russians more.

Truth leaks out

Russian immigrants were receiving secret mail and communications with their families still trapped behind the “Iron Curtain” a nickname for the border of Eastern Bloc countries and free Europe. Rumors began to emerge about lost Cosmonauts out in space who would never return and whose frozen depressurized  corpses would forever orbit the earth or be floating somewhere in interstellar space as a result of miscalculated telemetry or instrument malfunction had come out. The Vostok program was the first known series of manned space missions revealed by the Russians to the west. This was the space program that Yuri Gagarin piloted during the first successful orbital mission which beat the NASA Mercury series in the race to put a man in space, but prior to these known events are the hidden failures.

News of failures

Rumors escaped the Soviet Union alleging that a triple Cosmonaut spacecraft had lifted off and entered orbit but due to malfunction or error in calculations the manned vessel either was not able to re-enter earth’s atmosphere for recovery, or simply left orbit and ventured out into the solar system on an unrecoverable course. From intelligence channels US spy contacts were aware that a large number of animals sent up by rocket from Russian launch pads were largely killed by decompression or high G force re-entries. It was also known that the Russians weren’t too sentimental about their test pilots either as after World War II there was a plethora of war veterans out of work and anxious to fly anything if it meant keeping a job and food on the table. As a result of Stalinist brutality many of these test pilots were sacrificed while testing beyond Mach aircraft and other X project planes.

Cheap and dirty

In order to get a jump on the Americans it was evident that the Soviets would hurriedly rush into design and development phases with little thought to safety or redundant back-up systems that could save lives if an error or malfunction occurred. As a result, hastily conceived and fabricated space craft were rolled out for quick introduction and flight. The Soviets already had an edge over US rocketry by making larger missiles for warfare and they adapted these as booster rockets for three stage orbital flights, but their manned space craft to sit atop the rocket as the payload were in serious question.

Ominous first mission

On April 5, 1961 Sergey Ilyushin, son of the famous aircraft designer was discovered to have predated Yuri Gagarin into orbit, but was killed in flight. On April 12, 1961 the Soviets succeeded in launching another Vostok and Yuri Gagarin would be the first official man in space which preceded the US Mercury mission and flight of Astronaut, Alan Shepherd’s Capsule in August of 1961. Yet there are the unofficial Soviet missions that preceded the success of Gagarin’s flight.

The listening post

Beginning in the late 1950’s two Italian brothers using an abandoned German army bunker in the city of Turin began tapping into Russian Space Program communications. They made controversial recordings that indicated that there were fatalities occurring in the Vostok and other Soviet programs. Even though attempts were made to discredit their work the death of Sergey Ilyushin was not discovered until many years after his fatal mission as the Russians used Gagarin’s successful orbital flight to overshadow the previous failure. The Italian brothers built their listening device from electronic surplus they had purchased and proceeded to assemble an effective device.

In total the Judica-Cordiglia brothers released nine recordings over a period of four years. The details were as follows:

• May 1960, a manned spacecraft reports it is going off course.
• November 28, 1960, a faint SOSMorse Code signal is sent from another troubled spacecraft leaving Earth’s orbit.^[3]
• February 1961, a cosmonaut is audibly recorded suffocating to death.
• April 1961, a capsule is recorded orbiting the Earth three times before re-entering the Earth’s atmosphere just days before Yuri Gagarinmade his historic flight.
• May 1961, an orbiting spacecraft makes an appeal for help after going out of control.
• October 1961, a cosmonaut loses control of his spacecraft which veers off into deep space.
• November 1962, a space capsule misjudges re-entry bouncing off the Earth’s atmosphere and out into space.
• November 1963, a female cosmonaut dies during re-entry.
• April 1964, another cosmonaut is killed when his capsule burns up in the Earth’s atmosphere.

 

1965 Reader’s Digest article excerpt

In its short span of life, Torre Bert has plucked some remarkable messages from space. On November 28, 1960, for example, there was the cryptic message: “SOS to the entire world.” It came from a moving space vehicle and was repeated three times. Amateurs in Texas and Germany picked up the same message. Three days later Russia admitted a launch which had ended in failure – but did not mention a man aboard.

On May 17, 1961, the voices of two men and a woman were heard in desperate conversation – “Conditions growing worse why don’t you answer? … we are going slower… the world will never know about us . . .” Then silence. The same words were picked up in Alaska and Sweden. Their meaning? No one will know until the Russians choose to talk.

Conclusion

Whereas NASA has been forthcoming about their failures and deaths of their American astronauts since the first such event occurred during an Apollo I mock up test when an oxygen fire killed all three astronauts Ed White, Gus Grissom, and Roger Chaffee became the first of many unfortunate future disasters to come, but NASA was transparent over these deaths. Undoubtedly the challenge of space flight is filled with risk, but without courage, dedication, and the quest for knowledge such marvels of these achievements would have been impossible. Perhaps there is no fate more terrible than being stranded out in the cold black silence of space, yet these brave souls were willing to take that challenge.