What The Heck Is Going On?

[naomi24]

//Astronomers have detected a rare and extremely high-energy particle falling to Earth that is causing bafflement because it is coming from an apparently empty region of space....“You trace its trajectory to its source and there’s nothing high energy enough to have produced it,” said Prof John Matthews, of the University of Utah and a co-author of the paper in the journal Science that describes the discovery. “That’s the mystery of this – what the heck is going on?”//

 

https://www.theguardian.com/science/2023/nov/24/amaterasu-extremely-high-energy-particle-detected-falling-to-earth

 

 

Well?  What the heck is going on?

[retrocop]

We're doomed I tell ye.We're doomed!!!!

[sandyRoe]

There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in our philosophy.

[Ellipsis]

The chances of anything coming from there are a million to one ... but still they come!

[Canary42]

It's a stray bed bug got into the astronomers equipment.

[nicebloke1]

Jesus, not more immigrants.

[ToraToraTora]

Only 5% of the universe is matter as we know it. There must be interactions in the dark matter/energy that are little understood. There may be entire galactic sized clumps of dark matter, dark matter "stars" etc. Perhaps a dark matter "supernova" type explosion can force something into the non dark matter world. Just idle speculation on my part but our understanding continually grows, no doubt at some point this sort of thing will be explained.

[douglas9401]

Have they considered the possibility that it WAS a golf ball travelling at 95mph?

[Ken4155]

Could it be that there toolbox?😊

[dustypuss]

Dark matter. Light matter. Dose it matter.

[Old_Geezer]

They'll work it out eventually. It's the way science works; find a puzzle, speculate on it, try to test out your guesses until you discover what it really seems to be. 

 

Maybe they simply can't see the source. Maybe the path it took wasn't what appears to be a straight line. Who knows ?

[ToraToraTora]

I also have an issue with the "..followed the trajectory to the source" statement. How have they done that in the vastness of the universe? Much of the universe is so far away that the light hasn't reached us. Some of it is so far the light will never reach us.

[Atheist]

I hope that everyone here realises that it is not a single particle heading towards earth.

[ClareTG0ld]

No idea. 

I'll get back to this post, if anyone's interested, on the weekend - I did see the story earlier and was intrigued enough myself so I'm motivated to do a little digging anyway, but if anyone's curious I'll be happy to report back.

[Atheist]

Clare... I'd be interested to hear your comments.

[Old_Geezer]

So, it's a married particle ?