Page 12 - 201212 - The 'X' Chronicles Newspaper - December 2012
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5.5 -90 ::8=0-B C#C C E= Nibiru and Doomsday point, planes would be crashing because of accompanied by a giant invisible object and that 2012: Questions and incorrect GPS readings, and it would be the these disasters could happen any day. Others biggest news story of the century. These claims said the comet never existed but was a false Answers on obscure Internet sites are obviously wrong. rumor spread by the government to distract attention from Nibiru. This may be a preview of 17. Comet Elenin was widely believed to be a what we can expect in December 2012, when Continued from Page 11 threat when it passed by in September- many conspiracy nuts will likely continue to October 2011. Some people on the Internet claim that Nibiru will destroy the Earth right up 15. All my school friends are telling me that said it was on the same orbit as Nibiru, or to (or beyond) December 21. we are all going to die in the year 2012 due to that Nibiru was moving with it or hidden a meteor hitting earth. Is this true? behind it. What happened to Comet Elenin? 18. If Nibiru is not real, then why are all these terrible things happening in 2012? There Your friends are wrong. The Earth has always Comet Elenin attracted a great deal of attention must be some explanation for the been subject to impacts by comets and from pseudo-scientists and conspiracy theorists. earthquakes, floods, storms, solar outbursts, asteroids, although big hits are very rare. The Discovered in December 2010, it was a small and rising temperatures our planet is last big impact was 65 million years ago, and long-period comet, less than 4 km in diameter, experiencing. that led to the extinction of the dinosaurs. Today that fell apart when it got close to the Sun. Yet NASA astronomers are carrying out a survey during the months leading up to perihelion, the Over the four years that I have been answering called the Spaceguard Survey to find any large attention of many of the true believers in questions on this topic, each of the predicted near-Earth asteroids long before they hit. We doomsday 2012 shifted their attention to this 2012 disasters has been shown to be wrong. have already determined that there are no little comet, claiming that it endangered the Nibiru (or any other rogue planet) obviously threatening asteroids as large as the one that Earth. The first crazy rumor was that it was not does not exist, since if it were real we could see killed the dinosaurs. All this work is done really discovered by Russian astronomer it and feel the effects of its gravity. You could openly with the discoveries posted every day on Leonid Elenin. but that the name Elenin stood not hide it from the more than 10,000 the NASA NEO Program Office website for ELE=Extinction Level Event and professional and 100,000 amateur astronomers. http://neo.jpl.nasa.gov, so you can see for NIN=Nibiru Is Near. Then websites announced And there will be no planet alignment in 2012 yourself that nothing is predicted to hit in 2012. that it triggered the giant Japanese earthquake — that is a plain lie. The Earth’s magnetic flied and tsunami in March, and therefore it must be is not headed for a reversal, while large shifts in 16. There are many reports of shifts in the extremely massive – perhaps not a comet at all the rotational pole are impossible. Solar activity Earth’s axis (pole shifts). In 2010 several U.S. but something like a brown dwarf. Of course, is below normal, and the next solar maximum airports had to be realigned because the scientists knew Elenin was a comet and not a will not happen until 2013. Although we had directions had shifted. The sun appeared two massive object like a brown dwarf. First, Elenin one exceptionally large earthquake in Japan this days early in Greenland this year, and many fits the definition of a comet: It was a solar year, overall there has been no increase in people say the positions of sunrise and sunset system object with an elongated (eccentric) earthquakes worldwide. It is interesting how are different from any time it the paste. Fox orbit that was outgassing a tenuous atmosphere many people who write to me don’t seem to news recently reported that a pole shift was (coma) and tail as it approached the Sun. realize that astronomers and space scientists and to blame for the geese flying east. Are these Comets are defined operationally by the geologists are constantly monitoring and warnings of coming disaster in 2012? presence of the visible coma and tail. Second, recording what happens to the Earth, and any Elenin could not possibly be a massive object deviation would be immediately detected. The When people make claims about pole shifts, like a brown dwarf. If it were, it would not have one real change is global warming, as is well you need to ask if they are talking about the a coma or tail, since the gas cannot escape from documented by science. That helps explain the rotational pole or the magnetic pole. The an object with substantial gravity. In addition, if increase in storms and floods. And we know the directions North and South (and also East and it were massive we would by then have cause, which is the rising concentration of West) are defined by the rotation of the Earth. experienced its gravitational influence on the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. All we are The North Pole on Earth is the projection of the orbits of the planets, especially Mars and Earth left with for 2012 is a vague concern about the axis around which the Earth rotates, and east is (See Question 12). Finally, if it were a brown roll-over in the Mayan calendar, and scholars defined as the direction toward which the earth dwarf it would have been easily detected in can’t even agree on what year that happens. rotates. All this was known before Earth’s various previous astronomical surveys, even Doomsday is not real, but people’s fear magnetic field was discovered or magnetic when it was still in the far outer solar system. promoted by countless websites and YouTube compasses were invented. The magnetic poles During the summer of 2011, Elenin remained videos is unfortunately very real, and especially are not in the same place as the rotational poles, faint, and conspiracy websites accused NASA harmful for children. and they move around on the surface. A of a cover-up (not knowing, apparently, that it is compass therefore does not point to true north. the amateur astronomy community, not NASA, (Continued on Page 14) This drifting of the magnetic poles required the who photograph faint comets and measure their THE ORIGIN OF CUSTOMS renaming (not the reorientation) of several positions). Meanwhile, it was widely predicted runways at small airports that still use magnetic on the Internet that Elenin would do terrible TIPPING: headings. If the magnetic poles moved a large damage to the Earth when it came close in late Some think it began when some amount, or even if the magnetic field reversed, September. (The fact is that it never came closer restaurants had boxes labelled T.I.P. - To Insure we would have to recalibrate the directions on than a hundred times the distance to the Moon.) Promptness - on the wall beside their entrances. our magnetic compasses, but everything else The usual claims were made about triggering Patrons who wanted their food in a hurry would stay the same. GPS systems would not be pole shifts and huge earthquakes, this time deposited a few coins in the box before they sat affected. The Sun would still rise in the same predicted for September 26. In addition, it was down. place in the East. claimed on many Internet sites that the comet AN APPLE FOR THE TEACHER: The other stories deal with the rotation was so large that it would block out the Sun for Now an outmoded custom, it stems from axis, which is very stable. The supposed early the three days of September 26, 27, and 28, the days when public school teachers were paid sunrise in Greenland and many other claims that 2011. They also said that the U.S. Military with whatever the community they served could the Sun is rising or setting in different locations would be on full alert and that all the U.S. addord. Often they were given food or goods in are rampant on the Internet. Think about it. If government leaders would be taking shelter in lieu of cash. there were any shift in the Earth’s rotational the (fictional) bunkers under the Denver airport. axis, it would be instantly detected. All the In fact, Elenin was so small that it had begun to ADVICE TO SINGLES: computer drives on telescopes around the break apart by mid-September, as it neared the ;97 =30 < DG 1 B9> @,8= =9 20= world, and all of our GPS systems, depend on a Sun, and of course nothing happened on married, stand on your head and chew a pieve of stable rotation of the Earth. If it slipped even a September 26-27-28. Some conspiracy sites gristle our of a beef neck and swallow it and you tiny amount, telescopes wouldn’t be able to continued to claim that the comet was will get anyone you want.”