‘Victim of the Beast 666’ headstone a puzzle in Utah history

MYSTERY WIRE — The Salt Lake City Cemetery holds a mystery.

In a far northeastern corner, a grave marker with an inscription:

LILLY E. GRAY
JUNE 6, 1881-NOV. 14, 1958
VICTIM OF THE BEAST 666

The Utah Division of Archives and Records Service has followed the mystery into the state’s extensive records, but there’s no definitive explanation there. More detailed records of Lilly Gray’s life come from research by Jennifer Jones for The Dead History.

READ: Lilly Gray: Victim of the Beast 666

The birth date on the headstone is inaccurate, with records showing she was born June 4, 1880, in Ontario, Canada, to Wilmer and Francis Gray. She had a twin sister named Ethel. The family moved to Michigan shortly after the birth of the twins.

No record of Lilly surfaces until her 1918 marrage to Richard C. Walsh in Chicago. Richard died in 1925.

Lilly married again, less than a year later. Her husband was Frank Zimmerman, and they both worked at a post office in Chicago. Their marriage lasted until his death in 1943.

How she met her next husband, Elmer Gray, remains a mystery. She moved to Salt Lake City in 1950 for unknown reasons, and they married at the courthouse in Elko, Nevada, on July 11, 1952. Elmer was 71 and Lilly was 72.

While Elmer had numerous run-ins with the law previously, he settled down in marriage.

Lilly died of natural causes on the date inscribed on the headstone. Elmer lived on for nearly six more years. He died of a stroke on Halloween, 1964. He is buried in the same cemetery, but in a different area.

Jones writes in the Urban Legends section for The Dead History that Lilly Gray seemed to have a normal life, and that Elmer is responsible for the inscription. Concluding that Elmer Gray was a troubled man, Jones reports that the inscription probably had more to do with Elmer’s medical condition more than a hatred for the government, as some have speculated:

The truth behind Lilly’s headstone doesn’t involve murder, cults, or devil worship. Just an elderly man who had trouble staying on the right side of the law, and probably suffered from some mental effects of Parkinson’s Disease.

The Dead History account indicates that Elmer Gray used an alias during his troubled past, but had resumed using the name Gray by the time he met Lilly, who was Lilly Zimmerman at the time.

Luis Elizondo keeps his distance from ufologists for a reason
UFO

Luis Elizondo led AATIP – the Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program – when he worked for the Pentagon. He left a career to widen the discussion about UFOs, something that became impossible within government. In his second extended interview with investigative reporter George Knapp, Elizondo opens up on subjects he wouldn’t discuss before. Previously unaired, this interview was recorded June 27, 2018, in Las Vegas. First of 9 Parts.


by: George KnappPosted: Jan 16, 2020 / 11:33 AM PST / Updated: Jan 16, 2020 / 06:15 PM PST

George Knapp: Lue when we spoke last December, first time sitting right here, you had told me you were pretty much unfamiliar with the UFO community at large, and on purpose. You didn’t know this community and how it reacted. Now that you’ve had eight months, often being pounded by these folks, what are your thoughts?

THE INTERVIEW
Luis Elizondo keeps his distance from ufologists for a reason
Sorting out the AATIP, AAWSAP and BAASS UFO studies with Luis Elizondo
AATIP’s UFO findings more than Pentagon admits, Luis Elizondo says
Seeing the big picture crucial to UFO discussions, Luis Elizondo says
AAWSAP got UFO studies – and a lot more – started in 2007
Forces at Skinwalker Ranch may confound science … but not forever
Luis Elizondo on what should be secret, and studying ‘metamaterial’
To The Stars Academy knows more UFO videos are out there
Public role has tortured him, but Luis Elizondo saw it as the only way

Luis Elizondo: Well, that largely remains true to this day. I have purposely continued to try to sequester myself from from the rest of the larger community on purpose. It’s not that they don’t have anything good to say, I’m sure they do. But I am consciously trying to avoid having any type of analytic bias introduced into the analysis of the data that we’re engaged in. So what do I mean by that? You get a report, you look at the report, and there are some data points in there. And as you’re trying to conduct analysis on those data points, all of a sudden, subconsciously, you recall, maybe a conversation or an interview with somebody on TV. And all of a sudden now, without even trying to do it deliberately, some of those analytic bias now are being superimposed on your ability to analyze the data in a fair and objective way. And again, it’s not that these individuals aren’t smart or they don’t have anything good to say. A lot of them are exceptionally smart, in fact, probably a lot smarter than I am. But in the same respect, I really try to limit myself in being exposed to outside data points and innuendos, and suppositions. I personally don’t find that helpful. I think alternative analysis is critical. I think someone coming in with an opposing view is very, very important. But I, again, for me, I’ve always tried to lean towards just the facts, just the data. And leaving what my opinions are, try to leave those on the side because in the end, it doesn’t matter what I think. What matters is what the data says.

Knapp: You know, you could pretty much predict how the mainstream science guys — (Neil deGrasse) Tyson and those folks — are going to react to this. Dismissive as they’ve always been. The UFO people, it would seem like almost a surprise that they are so, not just alternate opinions, but hostile. As an intelligence guy or counterintel guy, how would you characterize that? I mean, is that a predictable kind of a thing?

WHO IS LUIS ELIZONDO? Read our dossier on his role in UFO investigations

Elizondo: It is. And I think it’s not just the UFO community or anybody else. I think anybody who has a preconceived notion of what something should be, and we saw this, even in DoD with senior leadership. They get an idea in their head and they think this is the way it’s going to be. It’s very hard to come in with a different narrative and expect people to just accept it. Because they spent a lot of time and effort in formulating these theories and these opinions, and in some cases you have some folks who’ve made actually very successful cottage industries. Pushing an agenda so people will, in essence, follow their narrative. And then all of a sudden you have some information that contradicts that And it can be a hard pill to swallow. And really you have two choices: either a get on board or fight it, and sometimes fight it violently. And we’ve seen that. We’ve seen individuals who are absolutely opposed to what we’re doing because in their opinion, it does not conform to the narrative that they have been been pushing for a long time. Now, you said something that I would like to address as well concerning folks like Mr. deGrasse Tyson, the very famous very, very intelligent physicist. Keep in mind, he and others are also subject to the same analytic bias. Let’s let’s look at it this way. Here’s a gentleman who spent a good portion of his younger career, proving the existence of something that by definition can never be observed. This is a man who spent a good portion of his career proving the existence of black holes that by definition, can’t be observed directly. The only way you can observe them is through the indirect measurements and direct measurements of how that black hole affects its environment, right, and perturbs the orbits of other things. And these things are millions of light years away. And so, here it is, you have a scientific-minded individual, proving the existence of something that we’ll never see in our lifetime. And yet something that is here on Earth that people are saying is occurring that you cannot see directly, not everybody anyways, all of a sudden now is too far of a reach. Right? And so I think we all have to pay attention to analytic bias. And again, back to the reason why I purposely do not pay attention much to the folks outside of the scientific community when it comes to data collection. Because in the end, it doesn’t matter about what your opinions are and what your feelings are. It matters what the data says. And that’s the only way we’re going to get ahead and that’s been so far the key, at least I think in our case. The key to our success here in TTSA is that we are facts-driven. It doesn’t matter what any one of us personally believes or thinks or anything else. It’s what can be observed and what can be extrapolated from that data.

Knapp: TTSA has taken some lumps. Tom has taken some lumps, unfairly to a large degree. I mean, when you look at what has happened since you stepped on that stage last October, it’s amazing change in the national conversation about this topic. TTSA is a driving force in that.

Elizondo: I’d like to think we are “a” driving force. I don’t think we are “the” driving force. I think to try to figure out what is the driving force, you have to look at it collectively. And George, I’d say you’re part of that driving force. I’d say people like Bob Bigelow, who’s been doing this long before AATIP became public, and he had his nose to the grinding wheel pursuing this endeavor. And and folks like Senator Harry Reid and Stevens and Inouye. Folks who believed in this enough, and who wanted to protect their country enough that they were willing to invest their time, resources and their reputations into an otherwise really, really sticky portfolio. A portfolio that a lot of people just don’t want to talk about because it’s surrounded by stigma, right? And that stigma is a political killer. It’s a career killer. It’s a, you know, there’s nothing good about it. You don’t get into this portfolio thinking, “Hey, I’m going to make a name for myself.” In fact, it’s probably either going to get you fired or it’s going to get you ostracized or it’s going to get you nowhere that you want to go. Fast.

NEXT STORY: Sorting out the AATIP, AAWSAP and BAASS UFO studies with Luis Elizondo


Copyright 2020 Nexstar Broadcasting, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

Historian ‘shocked’ at media’s new attitude toward UFOs - Part 1UFO / 4 days ago

UFO briefings, ‘Unidentified,’ and soft disclosure: Historian analyzes information flow -- Part 2UFO / 4 days ago  

‘UFO leak of the century’ contained in 15-page document, historian says -- Part 3UFO / 4 days ago

Arizona UFO incident in 1953 followed Nevada explosions; radar blamedUFO / 6 days ago

The Navy cryptically says it has top-secret UFO briefings that would cause 'exceptionally grave damage' to US national security if published

Sinéad Baker  Jan 15, 2020

An image from a video filmed by US Navy pilots in 2015 showing pilots reacting to a flying object. US Department of Defense/Business Insider


The Navy says it has material about UFOs that, if released, "would cause exceptionally grave damage to the National Security of the United States."
The Navy said it "discovered certain briefing slides that are classified TOP SECRET" in response to a freedom-of-information request, which asked about a series of videos that showed pilots baffled by mysterious, fast objects in the sky.
The Navy previously confirmed it was treating these objects as UFOs — which means they are being treated as unexplained but not necessarily extraterrestrial.

One of the videos was published by published by The New York Times in 2017, and pilots told The Times they saw the objects accelerate, stop, and turn in ways that went beyond known aerospace technology.

The Navy has said it has top-secret information about unidentified flying objects that could cause "exceptionally grave damage to the National Security of the United States" if released.

A Navy representative responded to a Freedom of Information Act request sent by a researcher named Christian Lambright by saying the Navy had "discovered certain briefing slides that are classified TOP SECRET," Vice reported last week.

But the representative from the Navy's Office of Naval Intelligence said "the Original Classification Authority has determined that the release of these materials would cause exceptionally grave damage to the National Security of the United States."

The person also said the Navy had at least one related video classified as "SECRET."

Vice said it independently verified the response to Lambright's request with the Navy.


Lambright's request for information was related to a series of videos showing Navy pilots baffled by mysterious, fast objects in the sky.

The Navy previously confirmed it was treating these objects as UFOs.

An image from a 2004 video filmed near San Diego showing a UFO. CNN/Department of Defense

The term UFO, along with others like "unidentified aerial phenomena" and "unidentified flying object," does not necessarily mean the object is thought to be extraterrestrial. Many such sightings ultimately end up having logical and earthly explanations — often involving military technology.

A spokeswoman for the Pentagon had also previously told The Black Vault, a civilian-run archive of government documents, that the videos "were never officially released to the general public by the DOD and should still be withheld."


The Department of Defense videos show pilots confused by what they are seeing. In one video, a pilot said: "What the f--- is that thing?"

The Pentagon spokeswoman Susan Gough said this week that an investigation into "sightings is ongoing."

Joseph Gradisher, the Navy's spokesman for the deputy chief of naval operations for information warfare, told The Black Vault last year: "The Navy has not publicly released characterizations or descriptions, nor released any hypothesis or conclusions, in regard to the objects contained in the referenced videos."

According to The Black Vault, Gradisher said the Department of Defense videos were filmed in 2004 and 2015. The New York Times also reported that one of the videos was from 2004.

You can watch the 2004 video here, as shared by To the Stars Academy, a UFO research group cofounded by Tom deLonge from the rock group Blink-182:


One of the videos was shared by The New York Times in December 2017, with one commander who saw the object on a training mission telling The Times "it accelerated like nothing I've ever seen."


Another pilot told the outlet: "These things would be out there all day."

Pilots told The Times that the objects could accelerate, stop, and turn in ways that went beyond known aerospace technology. Many of the pilots who spoke with The Times were part of a Navy flight squadron known as the "Red Rippers," and they reported the sightings to the Pentagon and Congress.

"Navy pilots reported to their superiors that the objects had no visible engine or infrared exhaust plumes, but that they could reach 30,000 feet and hypersonic speeds," the Times report said.

Scientists also told The Times they were skeptical that these videos showed anything extraterrestrial.


Gough, the Pentagon spokeswoman, would not comment to Vice on whether the 2004 source video that the Navy possessed had any more information than the one that has been circulating online, but she said that it was the same length and that the Pentagon did not plan on releasing it.

An image from the 2015 video. NYT

John Greenewald, the curator of The Black Vault, told Vice in September that he was surprised the Navy had classified the objects as unidentified.

"I very much expected that when the US military addressed the videos, they would coincide with language we see on official documents that have now been released, and they would label them as 'drones' or 'balloons,'" he said.

"However, they did not. They went on the record stating the 'phenomena' depicted in those videos, is 'unidentified.' That really made me surprised, intrigued, excited, and motivated to push harder for the truth."

US President Donald Trump said in June that he had been briefed on the fact that Navy pilots were reporting increased sightings of UFOs.

SEE ALSO: Here's why the Pentagon is so interested in UFO sightings

\

The UFO Sightings that Pushed the UK to Take 'Flying Saucers' More Seriously

The incidents interrupted Exercise Mainbrace, a massive set of NATO war-game maneuvers.

DAVE ROOS  JAN 15, 2020

In late September 1952, only months after a rash of “flying saucer” sightings over Washington, D.C. made headlines around the world, dozens of military officers participating in NATO exercises in the North Atlantic were struck by their own UFO fever.

Exercise Mainbrace was the largest peacetime military exercise since World War II. The war-game-style maneuvers simulated NATO’s response to a mock attack on Europe, presumably by the Soviet Union. The Mainbrace operation involved 200 ships, 1,000 planes and 80,000 soldiers from multiple NATO countries—including large deployments from the United States and the United Kingdom.

In a year dominated by news reports of UFO sightings, Pentagon officials half-joked with Naval Intelligence that they should keep an eye out for aliens during the NATO exercises, said Edward Ruppelt, the U.S. Air Force captain in charge of the top-secret Project Blue Book UFO investigations.

As it turns out, they weren’t off base. “[N]o one really expected the UFOs to show up,” Ruppelt wrote in his 1956 book, The Report on Unidentified Flying Objects. “Nevertheless, once again the UFOs were their old unpredictable selves—they were there.”

READ MORE: Interactive Map: UFO Sightings Taken Seriously by the U.S. Government
Not a weather balloon




The USS Franklin D. Roosevelt, where one of the Mainbrace sightings was made.

The National Archives

The first Mainbrace encounter came on September 13 when the captain and crew of a Danish destroyer spotted a triangular-shaped object moving through the night sky at alarming speeds. The unidentified craft emitted a blue glow and was estimated by Lieutenant Commander Schmidt Jensen to be traveling upward of 900 miles per hour.


On September 20, an American newspaper reporter named Wallace Litwin was aboard the USS Franklin D. Roosevelt, an aircraft carrier participating in the Mainbrace exercises, when he saw a commotion on deck: several pilots and flight-crew members pointing at a silver sphere in the sky that appeared to be following the fleet. Litwin quickly shot four color photos of the round object, which he assumed was a weather balloon.

In a letter to a UFO investigator years later, Litwin recounts that he went below deck and joked with fellow newspaper correspondents that he had just “shot a flying saucer.” This caught the attention of the ship’s executive officer, who informed Litwin that no weather balloons had been released that day. The officer then radioed the Midway, the only other ship in the vicinity, which also confirmed that no weather balloons were in the air or unaccounted for.

“In other words, the skies above this NATO fleet were very carefully observed and nothing flew around overhead unobserved,” wrote Litwin, “But I knew that I had taken a picture (4) of what looked like a ping-pong ball 10 feet over my head.”

Ruppelt and the Project Blue Book team followed up with the Navy and interviewed members of the flight-deck crew. Some dismissed it as a weather balloon, while others had their doubts.

“It was traveling too fast, and although it resembled a balloon in some ways,” wrote Ruppelt. And “it was far from being identical to the hundreds of balloons that the crew had seen the aerologists launch.”


READ MORE: Meet J. Allen Hynek, the Astronomer Who First Classified 'Close Encounters'
The Topcliffe sighting: ‘faster than a shooting star’



A British Meteor fighter jet circa 1950s, similar to the aircraft that the RAF's encountered the Topcliffe UFO.

SSPL/Getty Images

The most perplexing sighting—the one that may have single-handedly relaunched the British military’s interest in UFOs—was reported by a half-dozen Royal Air Force (RAF) officers and air crew based in Topcliffe, Yorkshire, England.

It took place on September 19, as a British Meteor fighter jet was returning to the Topcliffe airfield from exercises over the North Sea. When the plane had descended to 5,000 feet, crew on the ground spotted a silvery, circular object traveling several thousand feet above the Meteor, but on its same trajectory.

In a report preserved in the National Archives, RAF Flight Lieutenant John Kilburn of 269 Squadron said the object then began to descend toward the Meteor, “swinging in a pendular motion…similar to a falling sycamore leaf.” At first, Kilburn thought it was a parachute or engine cowling that had broken loose from the jet.

Then the object stopped suddenly in mid-air, rotated on its own axis and zipped off at incredible speeds over the horizon.

“The acceleration was in excess of that of a shooting star,” reported Kilburn. “I have never seen such a phenomenon before. The movements of the object were not identifiable with anything I have seen in the air.”

Unlike previous UFO sightings kept hush-hush by the RAF and Royal Navy, the Topcliffe sighting was leaked to the press—and splashed across the front page of Sunday newspapers. “‘Saucer’ Chased RAF Jet Plane,” reported the Sunday Dispatch with a photo of five of the airmen, including Kilburn.

The circus-like publicity surrounding the Topcliffe incident put the British military intelligence in a difficult spot. They couldn’t ignore questions from the press, but they also weren’t interested in a serious investigation into UFOs. They’d already been down that road.

READ MORE: UFO Stories
The secret UFO report shared with Churchill



A letter from Winston Churchill to the Secretary for Air, dated July 28, 1952, requesting an explanation on flying saucers.

The National Archives UK

While conducting research in the UK National Archives in 2001 for a book called Out of the Shadows: UFOs, the Establishment & the Official Cover-Up, British journalist and UFO investigator David Clarke made an incredible discovery. Despite officials’ repeated denials that they existed, he uncovered documents that referenced top-secret UK government UFO investigations.

The six-page report from the Ministry of Defence’s Directorate of Scientific Intelligence (the equivalent of the CIA in America), dated June 1951, was produced by a top-secret panel of military-intelligence experts known as the “Flying Saucer Working Party.”

According to the report, the five-member team had been meeting since 1950 to analyze reports of unexplained sightings from RAF and Royal Navy pilots. The Flying Saucer Working Party, much like the Air Force higher-ups overseeing the Project Blue Book investigations in America, dismissed all sightings by experienced military personnel as either “mistaken identification of conventional aircraft,” “optical illusions and psychological delusions,” known “astronomical or meteorological phenomena” or “deliberate hoaxes.”


The clandestine team concluded that the only way to get substantiated data on UFOs would be to establish a global network of radar stations and photographers continuously monitoring the sky for aberrations.

“We should regard this, on the evidence so far available, as a singularly profitless enterprise,” they wrote. “We accordingly recommend very strongly that no further investigation of reported mysterious aerial phenomena be undertaken, unless and until some material evidence becomes available.”

This was the conclusion shared with Winston Churchill when he fired off a memo in the summer of 1952 reading, “What does all this stuff about flying saucers amount to? What can it mean? What is the truth? Let me have a report at your convenience.” Churchill was shown the top-secret report and the topic of UFO investigations was briefly laid to rest. That is, until Exercise Mainbrace.

READ MORE: The Time Winston Churchill Wrote About Aliens
Mainbrace revives British UFO investigations—sort of

In the wake of the Topcliffe sighting and resulting newspaper coverage, the British military intelligence was forced to “officially recognize the UFO,” according to Ruppelt of Project Blue Book. In 1953, the British Air Ministry established a “UFO desk” within the Deputy Directorate of Intelligence known cryptically as “AI3.” From then on, all unexplained sightings by British military personnel would be controlled internally, classified as “restricted” and not shared with the press.



A chart of various UFO sightings from the 1950s through the 70s in the U.S. and U.K.

The National Archives UK

Clarke, for one, isn’t surprised that dozens of sailors and airmen spotted unidentified and unexplainable aerial phenomena during two weeks of high-stakes exercises.

“You have all these military personnel on high alert looking for potential intruder aircraft,” he says. “There’s a good chance they’re going to see things that might have otherwise been ignored.”

As to the seriousness of the British military’s investigations into Topcliffe and later UFO sightings, Clarke cites a newspaper clipping published months after the Mainbrace exercises where a reporter pressed an Air Ministry official for the results of their investigation. The official said he had “no idea” if the investigation was ongoing or if its conclusions would be shared with the public.

“Was there any chance that it might turn out to be a flying saucer?” wrote the reporter. “One gathered from the low chuckle of the official that there was not the remotest chance. ‘We take those stories with a large spoon of salt, old boy,’ he said.”

UPDATED:

JAN 15, 2020

ORIGINAL:

NOV 19, 2018

Meet J. Allen Hynek, the Astronomer Who First Classified UFO 'Close Encounters'

When the U.S. government tapped the academic to help investigate UFOs, he was initially a skeptic. But not for long.

GREG DAUGHERTY

Denver Post/Getty Images

Nevada County Police Blotter: UFO’s spotted in the sky

News | February 9, 202

NEVADA COUNTY SHERIFF’S OFFICE

Saturday

4:12 a.m. — A caller from Rough and Ready Highway reported former friend stole some necklaces from her unlocked vehicle.

5:46 a.m. — A caller from Big Blue Road reported 20 white colored UFO’s appearing in the sky and heading south.

THE CALLER SAW SOMETHING

#UFO FIRST WORD IS 'UNIDENTIFIED' THERE IS NEVER ANY MENTION OF ALIENS OR GREYS OR LITTLE GREEN MEN. 

SUCH PHENOMENA COULD BE THE SAME AS TRADITIONS OF FAIRY FOLK AND THE LIKE 

SEE JACQUE VALLEE 

Jacques Vallee - Passport to Magonia PDF 

Montreal's snowiest February 7 in over 90 years
As of 11 am Friday morning, local meteorologists claim that today is the city’s snowiest February 7 in 91 years.

According to YUL Weather Records, the last time Montreal experienced this much snow on February 7, 1929.

Tyler Jadah Feb 7 2020 @orettasunshine/Instagram


February’s first workweek is concluding with historical amounts of snow for Montreal.

See also:
21 shots of what a very snowy Montreal looks like right now (PHOTOS)
53 schools are closed across Montreal today due to inclement weather
Expect delays on the STM due to challenging driving conditions


Plus, Mother Nature isn’t finished yet. According to Environment Canada, “a total of 15 to 25 centimetres of snow is likely through this evening.” As the now is forecasted to persist throughout the rest of the day, northeasterly winds will gust up to 60 km/h.

🥈With a 11am snow total of 16cm, today is #Montréal‘s snowiest Feb 7th in more than 90 years, since Feb 7th, 1929. pic.twitter.com/5gh9t3tOFb

— Montreal Weather Records (@YUL_Weather) February 7, 2020


The weather agency urges travellers to postpone all non-essential travel until visibility and road conditions improve.

And hey, if we’re going to deal with snow, we may as well do so in historical proportions.


21 shots of what a very snowy Montreal looks like right now (PHOTOS)

Tyler Jadah
|
Feb 7 2020, 7:21 am

@shaunethompsonphotography/Instagram


Montreal has been blanketed with 15 cm of snow (and counting) since yesterday evening.


The province-wide whiteout is expected to pummel an additional 30 cm of snow throughout the rest of the day.

Amidst school cancellations, shovelling, and trying to navigate a car through the blizzard, nothing brings people together like posting snowstorm pictures onto social media.

The snowy silver lining is at least it’s a Friday…
See also:
53 schools are closed across Montreal today due to inclement weather
Chartered plane from Wuhan carrying 176 Canadians lands in Ontario
Google is opening a new office in Montreal

Whether you’re studying, working from home today, or if you’re still trying to convince your boss to let you go home, here’s what the warm and dry virtual world of Instagram looked like this morning after Montreal’s latest snowstorm.

Light earthquake rattles Ontario-Quebec border

Megan Devlin Feb 2 2020

Northern Ontario/Shutterstock


There was a light earthquake Sunday afternoon near Ontario-Quebec border.

Earthquakes Canada said the magnitude 4.0 quake happened near Haileybury, Ontario, which is an hour and a half drive north of North Bay.

Earthquakes of that strength can usually be felt, but don’t cause much damage.

According to the Government of Canada’s website, the causes of earthquakes in eastern Canada are not well understood, because the region is not near a tectonic plate boundary. Ontario is part of the stable interior of the North American plate.

See also:
9 earthquakes strike the coast of British Columbia over 3-day span
Blue Jays’ Hyun-Jin Ryu lands on MLB Network’s ‘Top 10 Right Now’ list
US airlines suspend flights to China due to coronavirus outbreak

“Seismic activity in areas like these seems to be related to the regional stress fields, with the earthquakes concentrated in regions of crustal weakness,” the website says.

About four earthquakes exceeding magnitude 4.0 are felt every year in Ontario, according to the government.

Earthquake rattles area near Gracefield, QC
Josh Pringle CTVNews Ottawa.ca Monday, February 3, 2020



OTTAWA -- A minor earthquake rattled western Quebec on Sunday.
Natural Resources Canada says a 3.0 magnitude earthquake struck 26 km northwest of Gracefield, Quebec just after 3 p.m.
No damage was reported.
On January 13, a 4.2 magnitude earthquake was felt in Salaberry-de-Valleyfield, Quebec, about 60 km east of Cornwall.
Several residents reported feeling that earthquake.

M 4.1 quake: Southern Yukon Territory, Canada on Sun, 9 Feb 23h12

Light magnitude 4.1 earthquake at 10 km depth

M 4.1 quake: Southern Yukon Territory, Canada on Sun, 9 Feb 23h12

Earthquake data (EMSC):

Date & Time: Sun, 9 Feb 23:12:10 UTC - 14 hours ago
Hypocenter depth: 10.0 km
Magnitude (Richter scale): 4.1

Did you feel the earthquake? Submit an I-felt-it report !

Latest  "I-felt-it" reports  about this quake:

77-Year-Old Amateur Astronomer Discovers Rare Galaxy Double Nucleus

TOPICS:AstronomyAstrophysicsIowa State UniversityPopular

By IOWA STATE UNIVERSITY FEBRUARY 6, 2020

Allen Lawrence, a 77-year-old who earned an Iowa State master’s degree in astrophysics in 2018, is first author of a paper revealing a rare double-nucleus structure in a well-known, nearby galaxy. Larger photo. Credit: Christopher Gannon/Iowa State University

Allen Lawrence, wrapping up a long career as an electrical engineer, was serious about moving his astronomy hobby beyond the 20-inch telescope he’d hauled to star parties under the dark skies of Texas and Arizona.

So in 2011 – in his late 60s, after 30 years of operating his own consulting firm around Green Bay, Wisconsin – he enrolled in some courses at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. It wasn’t long before he went around Sterling Hall asking about joining a research team.

Jay Gallagher, now the W. W. Morgan & Rupple Bascom Emeritus Professor of Astronomy at Wisconsin, offered Lawrence the chance to study one of two galaxy systems. Lawrence picked a nearby system studied since the 1960s and featuring the interaction of two galaxies, a larger one known as NGC 4490 (nicknamed the “Cocoon Galaxy” because of its shape) and a smaller one known as NGC 4485. The system is about 20% the size of the Milky Way, located in the Northern Hemisphere and about 30 million light years from Earth.

IR – Infrared Nucleus, OPT – Optical Nucleus. Credit: A. Lawrence, C. Kerton, C. Struck, et. al.

After taking a look at some infrared images from NASA’s Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, Lawrence said it looked like the larger galaxy had a rare double nucleus. One nucleus could be seen in visible wavelengths, the other nucleus was hidden in dust and could only be seen in infrared and radio wavelengths.

Well – after years of study, including earning an Iowa State University master’s degree in 2018 and continuing to work with Iowa State astronomers – Lawrence, at 77, is the first author of a paper revealing the NGC 4490 galaxy does, indeed, have a double nucleus. The paper is now online and has been accepted for publication by the Astrophysical Journal.

Co-authors of the paper are Iowa State’s Charles Kerton, an associate professor of physics and astronomy; and Curtis Struck, a professor of physics and astronomy; as well as East Tennessee State University’s Beverly Smith, a professor of physics and astronomy.

“I saw the double nucleus about seven years ago,” Lawrence said. “It had never been observed – or nobody had ever done anything with it before.”

Iowa State astronomers – Left to right, Charles Kerton, Curtis Struck and Allen Lawrence – have revealed a rare double-nucleus structure in a nearby and well-known galaxy. Credit: Christopher Gannon/Iowa State University

Some astronomers may have seen one nucleus with their optical telescopes. And others may have seen the other with their radio telescopes. But he said the two groups never compared notes to observe and describe the double nucleus.

The new paper describes “a clear double nucleus structure.” It says both nuclei are similar in size, mass and luminosity. It says both are similar in mass and luminosity to the nuclei observed in other interacting galaxy pairs. And, it says the double nucleus structure could also explain why the galaxy system is surrounded by an enormous plume of hydrogen.

“The most straightforward interpretation of the observations is that NGC 4490 is itself a late-stage merger remnant” of a much-earlier collision of two galaxies, the authors wrote. A merger could drive and extend the high level of star formation necessary to create such a large hydrogen plume.

The astronomers said there are other reasons they find the study of this system interesting:

Struck, who studies colliding galaxies, said double-nucleus galaxies are very rare, especially in smaller galaxies such as this one. And, he said astronomers think a double nucleus could contribute to the buildup of super massive black holes found in the center of some galaxies.

And Kerton, who researches star formation, said, “This project demonstrates that using multiple wavelengths from space- and ground-based observations together can really help us understand a particular object.”

Reference: “Revealing the Double Nucleus of NGC 4490” by AL Lawrence, C. R. Kerton, Curtis Struck, Beverly J. Smith, 16 January 2020, Astrophysics of Galaxies.
arXiv: 2001.05601

Bumble Bees Are Going Extinct in Time of Climate Chaos – “We Have Now Entered the World’s Sixth Mass Extinction Event”


By UNIVERSITY OF OTTAWA FEBRUARY 6, 2020


The Common Eastern Bumble Bee, Bombus Impatiens. Credit: Antoine Morin
University of Ottawa researchers develop technique to predict impact of climate change on species extinction risk.

When you were young, were you the type of child who would scour open fields looking for bumble bees? Today, it is much harder for kids to spot them, since bumble bees are drastically declining in North America and in Europe.

“We have now entered the world’s sixth mass extinction event, the biggest and most rapid global biodiversity crisis since a meteor ended the age of the dinosaurs.” — Peter Soroye

A new study from the University of Ottawa found that in the course of a single human generation, the likelihood of a bumble bee population surviving in a given place has declined by an average of over 30%.

Peter Soroye, a Ph.D. student in the Department of Biology at the University of Ottawa, Jeremy Kerr, professor at the University of Ottawa and head of the lab group Peter is in, along with Tim Newbold, research fellow at UCL (University College London), linked the alarming idea of ”climate chaos” to extinctions, and showed that those extinctions began decades ago.

“We’ve known for a while that climate change is related to the growing extinction risk that animals are facing around the world,” first author Peter Soroye explained. “In this paper, we offer an answer to the critical questions of how and why that is. We find that species extinctions across two continents are caused by hotter and more frequent extremes in temperatures.”

“We have now entered the world’s sixth mass extinction event, the biggest and most rapid global biodiversity crisis since a meteor ended the age of the dinosaurs, ” says Peter Soroye.
Massive decline of the most important pollinators on Earth

“Bumble bees are the best pollinators we have in wild landscapes and the most effective pollinators for crops like tomato, squash, and berries,” Peter Soroye observed. “Our results show that we face a future with many less bumble bees and much less diversity, both in the outdoors and on our plates.”

Climate change means places are getting hotter than ever before, and these extremes appear to be driving the disappearance of bumble bees across continents. Credit: Peter Soroye, University of Ottawa.

The researchers discovered that bumble bees are disappearing at rates “consistent with a mass extinction.”

“If declines continue at this pace, many of these species could vanish forever within a few decades,” Peter Soroye warned.
The technique

“We know that this crisis is entirely driven by human activities,” Peter Soroye said. “So, to stop this, we needed to develop tools that tell us where and why these extinctions will occur.”

“Predicting why bumble bees and other species are going extinct in a time of rapid, human-caused climate change could help us prevent extinction in the 21st century.” — Dr. Jeremy Kerr

The researchers looked at climate change and how it increases the frequency of really extreme events like heatwaves and droughts, creating a sort of “climate chaos” which can be dangerous for animals. Knowing that species all have different tolerances for temperature (what’s too hot for some might not be for others), they developed a new measurement of temperature.

“We have created a new way to predict local extinctions that tells us, for each species individually, whether climate change is creating temperatures that exceed what the bumble bees can handle,” Dr. Tim Newbold explained.

Using data on 66 different bumble bee species across North America and Europe that have been collected over a 115-year period (1900-2015) to test their hypothesis and new technique, the researchers were able to see how bumble bee populations have changed by comparing where bees are now to where they used to be historically.

“We found that populations were disappearing in areas where the temperatures had gotten hotter,” Peter Soroye said. “Using our new measurement of climate change, we were able to predict changes both for individual species and for whole communities of bumble bees with a surprisingly high accuracy.”

A new horizon of research

This study doesn’t end here. In fact, it opens the doors to new research horizons to track extinction levels for other species like reptiles, birds, and mammals.

“Perhaps the most exciting element is that we developed a method to predict extinction risk that works very well for bumble bees and could in theory be applied universally to other organisms,” Peter Soroye indicated. “With a predictive tool like this, we hope to identify areas where conservation actions would be critical to stopping declines.”

“Predicting why bumble bees and other species are going extinct in a time of rapid, human-caused climate change could help us prevent extinction in the 21st century,” says Dr. Jeremy Kerr.
There is still time to act

“This work also holds out hope by implying ways that we might take the sting out of climate change for these and other organisms by maintaining habitats that offer shelter, like trees, shrubs, or slopes, that could let bumble bees get out of the heat,” Dr. Kerr said. “Ultimately, we must address climate change itself and every action we take to reduce emissions will help. The sooner the better. It is in all our interests to do so, as well as in the interests of the species with whom we share the world.”

Reference: “Climate change contributes to widespread declines among bumble bees across continents” by Peter Soroye, Tim Newbold and Jeremy Kerr, 7 February 2020, Science.
DOI: 10.1126/science.aax8591

The paper Climate change contributes to widespread declines among bumble bees across continents is published in Science.

Funding: J.K. is grateful for Discovery Grant and Discovery Accelerator Supplement from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) and funds from his University Research Chair in Macroecology and Conservation at the University of Ottawa. J.K. is also supported through infrastructure funds from the Canada Foundation for Innovation. This collaboration was funded by a Royal Society grant to T.N. and J.K. and an NSERC Postgraduate Scholarship award to P.S. to work with J.K. T.N. was supported by a Royal Society University Research Fellowship and a grant from the UK Natural Environment Research Council (NE/R010811/1).