An 'unknown' burst of gravitational waves just lit up Earth's detectors

CNET ^ | 01/14/2020 | Jackson Ryan

[BenLurkin]

Earth's gravitational wave observatories -- which hunt for ripples in the fabric of space-time -- just picked up something weird. The Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO) and Virgo detectors recorded an unknown or unanticipated "burst" of gravitational waves on Jan. 14.

The gravitational waves we've detected so far usually relate to extreme cosmic events, like two black holes colliding or neutron stars finally merging after being caught in a death spiral. Burst gravitational waves have not been detected before and scientists hypothesize they may be linked to phenomena such as supernova or gamma ray bursts, producing a tiny "pop" when detected by the observatories.

This unanticipated burst has been dubbed, for now, S200114f, and was detected by the software that helped confirm the first detection of gravitational waves.

[Repeal The 17th]

I was talking about this with my neighbor just the other day...

[SubMareener]

Heim EQFT predicts that gravitational waves travel at 4/3 the speed of light, so any light event is yet to come.

[dontreadthis]

more or less

[garyb]

Ah, so that is why I gained weight today. I knew it couldn’t just be not eating right or not exercising.

[mrsmith]

LOL! I was working on a (very vaguely) nuclear experiment yesterday!

“Who knows what’s in the heart of the universe? The shadow knows!”

[laplata]

What kind of “light event” could we see?

[HombreSecreto]

Probably a Borg hive ship. Ignore it.

[fieldmarshaldj]

[blackdog]

My pool has a strange glow tonight.

[NativeSon]

Sorry, it was taco night.

[frank ballenger]

Let’s pray this isn’t coming:

Gamma Ray
TV show:Forecasting the End: Episode 2

When two stars from distant galaxies collapse and merge, a gamma ray burst is formed. If this happens close to Earth, the radiation could destroy the ozone layer and cause the ecosystem to collapse.
(They said the rays have to shoot right at us and if they miss by a little we will be saved. They move in straight, narrow lines.)

[Delta 21]

But with an unknown event source, it may be in a second or two, or maybe in a few thousand years.

[BipolarBob]

What kind of “light event” could we see?

A comet named "Wormwood" streaking towards us in a menacing fashion.

[MacNaughton]

[Lurkina.n.Learnin]

The sad part is the celestial event that obliterates us may have happened millions or even billions of years ago and just ain’t got here yet.

[Caipirabob]

The aliens know Trump has this in hand. Their work is done, they’re leaving.

[Stosh]

Anybody check on Nadler’s whereabouts lately?

[frank ballenger]

gaining weight....

Someone used to joke that since the universe neither allows matter to be created or destroyed then if someone loses some body fat it goes to another person as weight gain.

[sit-rep]

thats pretty heavy man...