Signal From Sun-Like Star Is Actually From An Earthling Satellite – says Perth Observatory

On the 29th of August news reports of a “SETI signal” being discovered from star HD164595 started appearing on the Internet.

The radio signal was originally detected back on the 15th of May 2015 by Russian researchers lead by N.N. Bursov at the Ratan-600 radio telescope in Zelenchukskaya, near the Russian border with Georgiawith the involvement from Claudio Maccone an Italian SETI astronomer.

The signal was coming from the star HD164595, a star that is quite like our own and is around 94 light years away from Earth in the constellation of Hercules. The star is only 1 percent lighter than the Sun,100 million years younger, and is of a similar temperature. It’s even composed of the same elements and can be viewed with binoculars or a low-power telescope.

“We indeed, discovered an unusual signal. However, an additional check showed that it was emanating from a Soviet military satellite, which had not been entered into any of the catalogues of celestial bodies,” team member Alexander Ipatov, from the Russian Academy of Sciences, told the Russian news agency TASS.

While only recorded for 2 seconds, the signal was extremely strong with a 2.7 centimetre (1.06-inch) wavelength and an 11 GHz frequency. This would make the strength of the signal comparable to that of a digital TV signal, which added to the hype around the signal. There was speculation in the media that the signal could’ve been caused by an isotropic beacon from a Type II civilization.

“The signal from HD 164595 is intriguing, because it comes from the vicinity of a sun-like star, and if it’s artificial, its strength is great enough that it was clearly made by a civilization with capabilities beyond those of humankind,” astronomer Douglas Vakoch, president of METI International, which searches for life beyond Earth, told CNN.

With the hype continuing to grow, scientists were as usual cautious to mention that the signal could also have been due to terrestrial radio-frequency interference or gravitational lensing from a more distant source. Douglas Vakoch also told CNN that “Without corroboration from an independent observatory, a putative signal from extraterrestrials doesn’t have a lot of credibility,”.

A couple of days after news of the signal was release, things started to unravel with researchers from the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI) observing the area using the Allen Telescope Array over two nights, but couldn’t find anything interesting.

Now the Russian Academy of Sciences have announced that the researchers who originally found the signal have discovered that the signal was nothing more than a Soviet military satellite.

“Last and this year, the telescope’s work has focused on searching for Sun-like stars,” Ratan-600 researcher Yulia Sotnikova told TASS.

“There have been no scientific results within the framework of this research so far. Some time ago, in the spring of this year, an unusual signal was received but its analysis showed that it was most likely a terrestrial disturbance.”

What happened was the signal coming from a Soviet military satellite somehow got mixed up in their findings, and that would explain the unusual strength of the signal.

While the news is disappointing for those who dream of finding intelligent life, it’s great to see so many astronomical organisations working together around the world in the spirit of cooperation.

It also means we just have to continue to be keeping our eyes and ears to the sky.

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