0380 - The Hessdalen Project
Biological Effects of the Hessdalen Phenomena
Erling Strand - Erling.P.Strand@hiof.no - Østfold University College,1757 Halden, Norway
The Hessdalen Phenomena (HP) are lights of unknown origin. .e lights can be split in three main types:
1. White or blue .ashed, with a life-time of maximum 2-3 seconds. Mostly the time is a fraction of a second, and can, due to that, be difficult to see.
2. Big yellow lights, which can stand still for minutes, or move around in the valley. Th.e size can be up to approx 10 meter in diameter. .The life-time has been measured up to two hours. .The intensity can be so strong that the ground, more than 20 m beneath it, is illuminated.
3. Several light together, organized, and move such that they all seem to be connected to one common object. Each of these lights seems to live their own life, by turning itself on and off. independently.
.The HP got its name from the small Hessdalen valley in Norway. Th.e amount of sightings in the Hessdalen valley. has changed over the years. Th.e most intense periode was from 1982 to 1984, with up to 20 observations a week. Now there are in the order of 20 observations a year. A 5 week .eld investigation was run from January to February 1984. 53 lights of unknown origin occurred during that period. .The following instruments were used: Spectrographic, still camera, seismograph, radar, spectrum analyzer, magnetometer,
Geiger counter, laser, IR viewer. .The phenomena were captured on radar, also when no lights was seen. 40% of the sightings occurred during a magnetic pulsation. A magnetic storm seems to increase the probability for a sighting. No heat has ever been recorded. .There are no burn marks.
Østfold University College put up an automatic station in Hessdalen, August 1998 .This station has recorded the phenomena on
pictures and videotape. Results from the fi.eld investigation 1984:
• Speed ranging from 0 to 30.000 km/h
• Location from ground level to high altitude.
• A main light may eject or attrack smaller light balls
• The HP are recorded on radar, even when no lights are seen.
• No seismic activity present. Th.e Hessdalen area is in a part of Norway with lowest seismic activity.
• More observations during high magnetic activity
• No heat radiation has ever been reported or measured.
Optical spectroscopy and radar analysis of transient luminous phenomena in the low atmosphere over Hessdalen valley
Bjørn Gitle Hauge - Institute of engineering, Østfold University College, Norway (bjorn.g.hauge@hiof.no)
For over 100 years glowing light balls of different sizes and colours has been observed in the low atmosphere over a remote Norwegian valley called Hessdalen . The light balls behaviour is transient and unpredictable, but the predominant trajectory is horizontal. The valley is located in the middle of Norway where the climate is sub arctic in winter and humid during summertime.
Hessdalen is famous for its mines with iron, zinc and copper ore. Big deposits of ore still reside inside the valley, and the mountains are penetrated by several Mineshafts, one of them as deep as 1000m. In the period of 1981 to 1984 big outbreaks of luminous phenomena’s was observed inside the valley, leading to a scientific investigation conducted by E. Strand. In 1998 The Østfold University college installed a automatic research station inside the valley and in 2000 the Italian institute for radio astronomy, IRA, installed UHF radar and electromagnetic receivers developed by S. Montebugnoli and J. Monari from the Medicina radio telescope.
Every year since 2000, field campaigns has been carried out in the first weeks of September. In 2007 a big outbreak happened again where the author managed to get simultaneous optical observations, video footage, optical spectrum analysis and radar data of huge light balls moving horizontally around in the valley for four hours. No sound was heard and no magnetic AC signals were detected, while electric field registrations were inconclusive. This result urging the need for more sensitive receiving equipment, which was supplied by French researchers in 2010 under the supervision of T. Farges & E. Blanc from CEA.
Optical living time has been observed from milliseconds up to two hours, while radar detection has confirmed living times up to four hours while invisible in the optical range. The radar reflections indicate a huge reflecting area, pointing towards the presence of ionisation inside the luminous balls. The radar echoes seem not to decay when the phenomena’s invisible state appears. The “bubbles” seems to come out of thin air, and the horizontal movement has similarities to standing waves.
Analyses of the phenomena’s optical spectrum indicate a high-energy state where the phenomena mostly are radiating in the UV range, with a spectrum shape similar to the Vega star. An ionized “bubble” radiating in the UV spectrum may explain the invisible state, but how this energy build up can take place is still to be found. In 2010 a fisheye, all-sky camera, was installed at the mountain Skarvan at 1000m altitude where the phenomena showed up under the horizon down in the valley, indicating that the place of birth is down in the valley/mines, this separating the Hessdalen phenomena from Sprites that are observed in the middle atmosphere.
Infrasound and wideband electric field measurements during Hessdalen Science camp 2010
Thomas Farges - 1, Elisabeth Blanc, Blanc1 and Bj Bjørn G. Haugern Hauge2 - 1:CEA / DAM /DIF, 91297 Arpajon Cedex, FRANCE – thomas.farges@cea.fr; 2: Østfold University College, 1757 Halden, NORWAY
Brief luminous phenomena are observed since at least 25 years in the low atmosphere above the Hessdalen valley. The valley is located in the middle of Norway, 120 km southeast of Trondheim at latitude 62°41’ North and longitude 11°12’ East between two mountain ranges, at an altitude of 600 m. This phenomenon, still unexplained, appears like a glowing light ball with dimensions ranging from decimetres up to 30 m. The glow is brighter than high magnitude stars.
It may be localised in a single point and lasts less than one second or may move inside the valley during several seconds or even tens of seconds. Since the mid of 1980’s, camera observations and radar measurements have given qualitative and quantitative observations which complement the observations reported by Hessdalen Valley inhabitants.
Each year, since 2000, a Science camp took place in Hessdalen in the beginning of September. During the last camp, from 6th to 13th,September 2010, different instruments were installed by Norwegian, Italian and French institutes.
CEA participated for the first time to this camp with electric field and infrasound measurements. Such experiment was motivated by previous radar echoes related to camera observations, demonstrating the presence of ionisation inside the luminous ball. Electric field or infrasound are then expected, as other transient luminous events, like sprites inside the middle atmosphere, are sources of such emissions. Two different experiments were thus installed by CEA: an infrasound array and a wideband (1 kHz – 5 MHz) electric-field antenna. During the week, a fish-eye camera, operated by Østfold University College, on the top of a mountain, caught several events including a long one (~2km length). We show, in the paper, first results obtained at the same time.
Existence of electric/magnetic signals related to unknown luminous lights observed in Hessdalen valley (Norway)?
J. Zlotnicki, P. Yvetot, and F. Fauquet - CNRS, UMR6524-OPGC, Aubiere, France (jacques.zlotnicki@wanadoo.fr)
J. Zlotnicki1, P Yvetot1, F. Fauquet2, E. Strand3 and B. Hauge3 - 1: CNRS; UMR6524-OPGC-UPB, France 2: OPGC-UPB, 24 av des Landais, 63177 Aubière cedex, France 3: Østfold University College, Norway
Hessdalen valley, in Norway, is a north-south elongated basin of about 20 km by 10 km (latitude: 62.50’N, longitude: 11.12’E) in which few inhabitants are permanently living. Since several decades, scarce observations made mainly during night time have point out transient luminous lights, called Hessdalen phenomena (‘HP’).Østfold University College was the first pioneer research centre which started to install visual and geophysical monitoring systems able to track the unknown lights (http://www.hessdalen.org/). The characteristics of the HP can be summarized as followed.
They can appear in the low atmosphere, remain quite fixed and suddenly move up at a speed of several hundreds of km/s, for disappearing on the ground or in one the numerous lakes located in the area. The duration can be of a very seconds to a tens of minutes or more. The HP can be white, blue-white flashing lights, yellows or white lights and have different shapes with sizes up to some cubic metres. From 80 observations per month in the 1980’s, the number has sharply decreased to about 20 per year nowadays. In 2010, French Research Centres started cooperation with Østfold University College and the Istituto di Radio Astronomia of Bologna (http://www.ira.inaf.it/). The objectives are to study radio emission in the frequency band 1 kHz to 5 MHz (see Farges et al., EGU
2012) and the possible disturbances of the electromagnetic (EM) field recorded at two remote stations located in the valley. The two EM stations are located a tens of kilometres apart along the valley axis. In the northern FIN station, a fluxgate magnetometer (resolution of 1/100 nT), two orthogonal induction coils (frequency band: 7 Hz - 8 kHz, resolution 1/100,000 nT), and two horizontal electric lines (few mV resolution) record the magnetic and electric fields, respectively. In addition, a vertical seismometer is linked to the multi-parameter FIN station. At the south OYU station, two induction coils and horizontal electric lines are set. All data are recorded at 40 Hz. We present the morphology of the EM field in the area which can define the background noise and the morphological evolution of the EM field along the axis of the valley. Some of the EM variations appear to be phase-delay of several minutes between the two stations which lead to suspect important distortions brought by superficial geological structures (mineral deposits?), some electrical current channelling and the local tectonics. During the last 2010-2011 winter campaign, only few observations by eyes were reported. During these periods, no large magnetic or electric signal was clearly identified.
Different states of the transient luminous phenomena in Hessdalen valley, Norway
Geophysical Research Abstracts - Vol. 14, EGU2012-12098-3, 2012 - EGU General Assembly 2012 - B.G Hauge (1) and S. Montebugnoli (2) (1) Østfold University College, Faculty of Engineering, Fredrikstad, Norway (bjorn.g.hauge@hiof.no), (2) Istituto di radioastronomia, Radiotelescopi di Medicina, Bologna,Italy (s.montebugnoli@ira.inaf.it)
The transient luminous phenomena’s in Hessdalen valley has at least been observed for 200 years, since 1811, when the priest Jacob T. Krogh did the first written documentation. The valley is located in the middle of Norway, isolated and with sub arctic climate.
The former mining district has no more than 140 inhabitants, and the deep mines are closed and filled with water. The valley has been under scientific surveillance since 1998 when the first automated and remote controlled observatory was put into action. Today a Norwegian, Italian and French collaboration runs 3 different research stations inside the valley. Each year a scientific field campaign establishes 4 temporary bases in the mountains, and up to 100 students and researchers man these bases for up to 14 days in september when the moon is down.
The Hessdalen phenomena is not easy to detect, and approximately only 20 observations is done each year. The work done the last 14 years suggests that the phenomenon has different states, at least 6 detected so far. The states are so different that to se a coupling between them is difficult. New work done into dusty plasma physics suggest that the different phenomena’s may be of the same origin, since the ionized grains of dusty plasma can change states from weakly coupled (gaseous) to crystalline, altering shape/formation and leading to different phenomena.
Optical spectrometry from 2007 suggested that the luminous phenomena consisted of burning air and dust from the valley. Work done by G.S Paiva and C.A Taft suggests that radon decay from closed mines may be the mechanism that ionizes dust and triggers this phenomena.
The 6 different main states of the Hessdalen phenomena, Doublet, Fireball, Plasma ray, Dust cloud, Flash and Invisible state is described and discussed. Investigation of the atmosphere inside the Hessdalen valley with low frequency directional RADAR, reveals large areas of ionized matter, giving a reflecting area big enough to saturate the input of the radar receiver.
Together with long living time, ground analysis and radio active measurements, do not support the radon decay theory, and other forms of ionizing mechanisms must be investigated. The phenomenon’s energy source is still not revealed, and the question of internal or external power source is also unexplained.
Unknown Radio Emission at About 3 Mhz recorded in Norway
Geophysical Research Abstracts - Vol. 14, EGU2012-5186, 2012 - EGU General Assembly 2012 - © Author(s) 2012 - Unknown radio emission at about 3 MHz recorded in Norway - T. Farges (1), E. Blanc (1), and E. Strand (2) - (1) CEA, DAM, DIF, France (thomas.farges@cea.fr, 0033 169267130), (2) Østfold University College, Norway
A wideband electric field antenna has been installed in Norway (at Hessdalen, 62.41’ North and 11.12’ East). A signal of 50 ms is automatically recorded every 5 s in order to monitor the spectral variations from 1 kHz to 5 MHz. Signals have been acquired during more than one year from September 2010 to December 2011. The measured electromagnetic spectrum is very similar to other spectra commonly measured in other places in the World.
It shows emissions in numerous bands at fixed frequencies corresponding to radio transmissions in VLF, LF, MF and HF bands. However, one emission is quite different and arouses our curiosity. We find a quasi-continuous radio emission at a frequency varying from 2.7 to more than 3.4 MHz with a mean value of 3.0 MHz. The bandwidth is quite large (about 40 kHz) while it is about 9 kHz for all the other radio emissions at frequencies higher than 100 kHz. During the night, the frequency is relatively stable at about 3.1 MHz while during day-time a frequency shift of 200-300 kHz is often observed. These variations can be quick (few tens of minutes) or slow (several hours).
Moreover, the emission disappears during day-time, the disappearance duration depending on the daylight duration. From November to the end of March, there is almost no disappearance while in April disappearances are more frequent and longer. From May to July, the emission disappears systematically during day-time from 6:00 UT to 20:00 UT. At the sunrise time the emission frequency suddenly decreases and systematically disappears when it reaches a threshold value (from 2.7 to 2.85 MHz). The emission (frequency and duration) is not influenced by the magnetic storms. We will show in the paper statistical results and some hypothesis on the mechanism which can produce this radio emission.
Magnetic influence on the unidentified luminous phenomena in Hessdalen, Norway
Bjørn Gitle Hauge (1), Anna-Lena Kjøniksen (1), Erling Petter Strand (1), Jaques Zlotnicki (2), and George Vargemezis (3) - (1) Østfold University College, 1757 Halden, Norway, (2) CNRS; UMR6524-OPGC-UPB, CLERMONT-Fd, France, (3) -Aristotele University of Thessaloniki, Thessaloniki, Greece
Unidentified luminous phenomena have been observed in the low atmosphere over the Hessdalen valley for decades. First scientific investigation was done by E.Strand in 1984, where spiral movements of lights was recorded. The Science Camp program has conducted yearly field investigations since 2002 and has confirmed the existence of this spiral-behavior. (http://sciencecamp.no) Such behavior has also been documented in Alabama, USA.
In September 2015 spiral like movement of lights was observed together with the more common spherical lights. This spiral movement indicates the presence of low atmospheric charged matter, moving in a magnetic field. A geological survey in 2014 reviled the presence of strong magnetic anomalies. The valley contains several abandoned copper mines containing Chalcopyrite and Magnetite. The Magnetite was not useful in the copper production, and left in heaps around the valley unused. This may contribute to the magnetic anomalies in the valley.
Magnetic Influence on the Unidentified Luminous Phenomena in Hessdalen
Bjørn Gitle Hauge (1) and Erling Petter Strand (2) - (1) Østfold University College, Engineering, Electronics, Fredrikstad, Norway (bjorn.g.hauge@hiof.no), (2) Østfold - University College, Computer sciences (erling.p.strand@hiof.no)
Red, white/yellow and blue balls of light have been observed in the low atmosphere over the Hessdalen valley , Norway, standing still and moving horizontally with random speed. Characteristics of these transient luminous phenomena in Hessdalen, and data from America, suggest that the process which creates these low atmospheric plasmas is a global mechanism, not only localized to the remote and desolated Hessdalen valley in Norway (62Deg.N - 11Deg.E).
Transient luminous phenomena’s has been observed in the low atmosphere over the Hessdalen valley for over 200 years. The first written documentation goes back to 1811 when the priest Jakob Tode Krogh wrote about it in his diary. Since 1982, inhabitants, tourists, journalists and scientists have done recurrent observations. E.P.Strand conducted the first scientific campaign in 1984, documenting over 50 observations in one month. 15 years later, Norwegian and Italian scientists installed the first permanent automated research base here.
In 2010 French researchers joined this collaboration and installed two additional research bases. This transient luminous phenomenon, TLP, has been detected simultaneously on optical and radar devices, but electromagnetic radiation from this phenomenon has until now eluded detection. Smirnov (1994) and Zou(1994) was among the first scientist who used plasma physics trying to explain this phenomenon. Work done by Pavia & Taft (2010 and 2012) suggests that the TLP in Hessdalen probably is dusty or cold plasma, arranged as a cluster of Coulomb crystals.
Optical spectrum data obtained by Strand (1984), Teodorani (2004) and Hauge (2007) showing a continuous optical spectrum support this hypothesis. Pictures of spiraling light rays obtained by Strand in 1984, and Hauge in 2004 and 2010 suggests that this plasma is moving in a strong magnetic field, and might be created by it. Radar reflections from the TLP in Hessdalen obtained by Strand in 1984 and Montebugnoli and Monari in 2007 points towards that the TLP acts as an reflecting surface for electromagnetic waves in the frequencies ranging from 0,4 – 10GHz, which ionized matter, plasma, will do.
The non-explained TLP in Hessdalen may therefor be related to the generation of low atmospheric plasma, created by an undetected energy /excitation source. Data obtained from Mexico and USA seems to correlate with the characteristics of the Hessdalen phenomena, suggesting that the mechanism creating the Hessdalen phenomena is global and not only localized to the Hessdalen valley. These data will be shown and analyzed. Hessdalen is known for having a very high frequency of TLP observations yearly, compared to other places in the world. This very active process creating TLPs in Hessdalen may be connected to magnetic pulsations/storms since several optical observations done the last 6 years are coupled to Aurora Borealis outbreaks in the Hessdalen atmosphere. Aurora borealis is often seen on these latitudes, and this may be one of the explanations for the high observation frequency.
The Hessdalen region is an old mining district with deep mining-shafts, going down to 1000m of depth, and huge layers of zinc and copper ore. This creates conducting channels for current in the ground and reflecting surfaces for electromagnetic radiation. Examining these physical facts coupled to outbreaks of Aurora borealis may contribute to an better understanding of the mechanisms creating atmospheric plasma in Hessdalen valley and other places in the world.
Optical luminosity of the transient luminous phenomena in Hessdalen, Norway
Bjørn Gitle Hauge, Anna-Lena Kjøniksen, and Erling Petter Strand Østfold University College, Engineering, Halden, Norway (bjorn.g.hauge@hiof.no)
Transient luminous phenomena has been observed in the low atmosphere over Hessdalen valley for several decades, first report is claimed to be 200 years old. The area is scattered with old copper, zinc, sulphur and iron mines. The river Hesja divides the valley, running south to north. The river descends from 800 m altitude to 600m. In the middle of the valley, an old copper and sulphur mine feeds the river with its acidic sulphur pollution. Eyewitnesses have reported lights emerging from the river, but most reports are of lights suddenly emerging in low altitudes over the valley, 1000m – 2000m altitude. Common colours are white, yellow, orange and blue. Green is absent.
The optical spectrum of the white lights has been obtained several times, indicating a continuous spectrum. The luminosity of the Hessdalen lights has been debated, some speculating that the phenomenons radiant power reaches up to 1MW. A more moderate calculation done by Teodorani in 2004 suggests 19KW. The cause of the huge difference is due to uncertainty in establishing correct distance to the phenomenon. Recent discoveries done by this team, indicates that the radiant power is usually much lower. For the first time in Hessdalen, pictures with optical spectrums was obtained at a distance not more than 500m. Two similar observations were done from the same position, indicating a possible birthplace. Atmospheric data and spectrum analysis was also coinciding. Data from this short distance observation will be presented.
Returning to the mysterious sphere photographed in Hessdalen, the researcher Bjorn Gitle Hauge, when asked if the captured phenomenon was due to the presence of some reflection or even the moon , responds by saying that, in order to avoid the body's presence selenita, researchers used automatic shooting camera when the moon had not yet risen, and in the case of the sighting at 11:21(local time), the day September 16, 2015 , about a half hour after sunset. A phenomenon so that remains unexplained.
The image disclosed at the Annual Congress of Geophysics in Vienna (Austria):
Above the mysterious ball of light photographed in Hessdalen (Norway).
He has created astonishment the image of an ' anomalous luminous phenomenon ' photographed by a group of scientists from the ' Ostfold University College and presented at the annual Congress of Geosciences in Vienna on April 25, 2017 .
The image, never released before, was taken in the month of September 2015 to the north of the resort of Skarvan (Norway) , from the inside of a search field tent, using a hyperspectral camera (with shutter speed regulated than five seconds), which is capable of capturing images in real time on the bands of electromagnetic frequencies ranging from ultraviolet to infrared ..
Gitle Bjorn Hauge , a researcher at the ' #Ostfold University College , claimed to have captured a glowing sphere about 100 meters away , which then subsequently hovering , seemingly, about 30 meters above the ground, illuminating the ground below .
The phenomenon unidentified was recorded both instrumentally , both visually and by researchers, who came out of the tent to watch the phenomenon now in decline.
#hessdalen , and its valley, is not new to such apparitions, which began to escalate in 1982 of the last century and has seen witnesses not only local citizens, but also many scientists who for years now have their headquarters in these places ..
From the point of view of scientific research, it is not used - to catalog these phenomena - the military term #ufo (although in rare cases have been spotted just real three-dimensional objects, metallic and solid), but the scientific term UAP (Unidentified Aerial phenomena) , it is seen that most of the phenomena do not seem to have a defined structural bearing, but a kind of pure energy that could be explained by the presence of an electromagnetic plasma .
Returning to the mysterious sphere photographed in Hessdalen, the researcher Bjorn Gitle Hauge, when asked if the captured phenomenon was due to the presence of some reflection or even the moon , responds by saying that, in order to avoid the body's presence selenita, researchers used automatic shooting camera when the moon had not yet risen, and in the case of the sighting at 11:21(local time), the day September 16, 2015 , about a half hour after sunset. A phenomenon so that remains unexplained.
Vérifications:
Météore venant de face : pas de radiant signalé juste au Nord de Castor et Pollux
Flash géostationnaire : non, puisque c'est plein Nord
En flash satellitaire (j'ai pris Hostalen comme point de référence) calculables : Calsky indique que le satellite Iridium 70 a flashé à 21h13m49s, mais à 55° ENE dans Cassiopée.
Dans l'heure qui a suivi, plusieurs flashs Iridium ont eu lieu pas très loin du point mystérieux !
A 21h45m35s, Iridium 81 flashe à -2,8m à 22° plein Nord, dans le Lynx
A 21h47m53s, Iridium 42 flashe à -4,6m à 21° plein Nord, dans le Lynx
A 21h55m06s, Iridium 82 flashe à -0,1m à 18,5° plein Nord, dans le Lynx
Ca, ce sont les flashs satellitaires calculables. Un éventuel flash non calculable de satellite est également possible.
Pour ce qui est des avions, a priori Planefinder n'indique rien qui arrive du Nord, mais les données ont l'air incomplètes
Log - Wednesday, 16 September 2015
Log start 3:46 p.m.
3:46 p.m. - Staffing arrive HK, how good S and high G occurs umiddlerbart
6:16 p.m. - Bjorn Gitle and Anna-Lena goes to Skarvan
7:06 p.m. - Bjorn Gitle and Anna-Lena arrive Skarvan
7:11 p.m. - HK determines that the sentence in the log is superficial, 4 votes against 1
7:12 p.m. - Øyungen calibrate værmåleutstyr and emits Weather Report where the temperature is 7.9 ° C, humidity are 6.69% and wind speed is 4.1 m / s
7:43 p.m. - HK prompted to help Skarvan laser calibration by emitting human blink
7:45 p.m. - Skarvan been calibrated and successful
7:55 p.m. - HK reader of conditions where the temperature is 7.2 ° C, relative humidity is 78%, the wind speed is 4.7 m / s and direction the south / south-west
7:56 p.m. - Skarvan emits Weather Report where the temperature is 5.6 ° C, relative humidity is 86%, the wind speed is 5.8 m / s, the wind direction is north / north-east, atmospheric pressure is 1004 hPa and radioactivity is 0.07 μSv
19 58 - Øyungen emits Weather Report where the temperature is 6.7 ° C, humidity 82%, wine dhastighet is 5.4 m / s, the wind direction is south, atmospheric pressure is 905.1 hPa and radioactivity is 0.08 μSv
8:37 p.m. - Skarvan reports that two cars were seen driving into the mountains north-west, without having returned
8:48 p.m. - Øyungen report observed light through spektralkamera below the horizon in the direction south-west, photo number 0443NEF
8:55 p.m. - Skarvan report observed light with continuous spectrum and yellow-white color under the northern sky
8:57 p.m. - Øyungen emits Weather report where the temperature is 6.2 ° C, humidity 85%, wind speed is 0.7 m / s, wind direction is south, the air pressure is 903.6 hPa and radioactivity is 0.11 μSv
8:59 p.m. - Skarvan report observed light having strong intensity, blinking, below the horizon, next HK, 25 °
9:02 p.m. - Skarvan emits Weather report where the temperature is 5.1 ° C, humidity 89%, wind speed is 5.8 m / s, wind direction is north, the air pressure is 1004.1 hPa and radioactivity is 0.07 μSv
9:05 p.m. - Øyungen report observed light, static and blinking against the mountain side, 0 °
9:06 p.m. - Skarvan report flashlight activity
9:07 p.m. - Øyungen corrects degree information on the light observed 9:05 p.m., 350 °
9:09 p.m. - Øyungen gives update on the observation that was made 9:05 p.m., informs even a flashing light
9:11 p.m. - Øyungen reports observing several flashing lights on the mountainside on Skarvan
21:14 - Skarvan reports Observer light with continuous spectrum in retnign north, between 10 ° -20 °
21:16 - Øyungen report repeated observation of more flashing lights on the mountainside on Skarvan, 330 °
21:21 - Øyungen report high activity on Inspire
21:22 - Skarvan report observed light streak with red and white color of the water, 285 °, possible car
21:24 - Øyungen report steady lysaktivitet mountain on Skarvan
21:25 - Cormorant contacts Øyungen regarding their light observation and informs that there are opportunities that observed light can come from the tent
21:26 - Skarvan gives update on the observation that was made 21:22, they stand on their that it resembles a car
21:28 - Øyungen gives update on lysoberservasjon against mountainside on Skarvan, where it deepened that the flashes are sporadic
9:29 p.m. - Skarvan report oberservert lights with changing intensity that moved, over the water, 250 °
9:33 p.m. - Skarvan Ute report observed light with white-green color, stationary, below the horizon, 160 ° -170 °
9:34 p.m. - Øyungen report observed light streak of blue color, over the mountain on Skarvan, 340 °
9:35 p.m. - Øyungen gives update on previous observation, ascribe the observation of light with red color in the same direction
21 36 - Skarvan Inside report observed light with continuous spectrum through eastern camera
21:36 - Øyungen report observed light with red color, flaming, over the horizon, 280 °
21:37 - Skarvan report observed light with white color, continuous
21 37 - Øyungen gives update on observation made 9:36 p.m., two fiery light is observed, numbering 0519NEF, possible car
9:39 p.m. - Skarvan report observed light on two consecutive images through eastern camera, first observation has weak intensity, the next observation has stronger intensity and movement;
9:40 p.m. - Skarvan report a red light in the east
9:47 p.m. - Skarvan Ute announces light to the west over the water, was observed, but quickly disappeared
9:49 p.m. - Øyungen report activity different places in the sky, the light is red and blue
9:50 p.m. - HK asks if Skarvan use headlights, the answer is no
9:51 p.m. - Skarvann Ute report earlier that previously observed light in the west is back
9:51 p.m. - Øyungen report that Erling and Josefine heads for HK
9:53 p.m. - Skarvan report observation of flare with white color throughout western camera, below the horizon
9:55 p.m. - Skarvan announces that last observation was the result of reflex use
9:56 p.m. - Skarvan Ute reports that the observation made 9:47 p.m. now disappeared
9:58 p.m. - Øyungen report observation of bar-shaped flash of light with a bluish color at grøftegrumpa in the river between Øyungen and Skarvan
22:00 - Øyungen report that they have two channels, Øyungen Ute and Øyungen Inside
22:00 - Skarvan emits Weather Report where the temperature is 5.2 ° C, relative humidity is 91%, the wind speed is 3.1 m / s, the wind direction is south-east, air pressure is 1004.2 hPa and radioactivity is 0.16 μSv
10:02 p.m. - Øyungen emits Weather Report where the temperature is 6.9 ° C, relative humidity is 86%, the wind speed is 3.1 m / s, the wind direction is south, atmospheric pressure is 905.3 hPa and radioactivity is 0.10 μSv
22: 08 - Skarvan Ute report stagnant white flashing light on the water surface, 240 °
10:10 p.m. - Øyungen report high activity on Inspire
10:10 p.m. - HK asks if Øyungen see light across the water. They did not
10:12 p.m. - Øyungen report green spot of light on the camera in the west. Picture number 2204
10:13 p.m. - Øyungen reports white flash of light against the mountain side, 360 °
10:15 p.m. - Skarvan report a white light with continuous spectrum of light above the horizon at the camera in north
10:15 p.m. - Erling, Josefine and TV teams arrive HK
22 : 20 - TV team holds interviews with some of the staff on HK, which leads to reduced labor
10:42 p.m. - Skarvan report light that moves with uneven pace over Øyungen-water, 250 °
10:47 p.m. - Skarvan reports more light observed: red, blue and white across the river
10:49 p.m. - Skarvan report three flashes of light with continuous spectrum observed in camera in the west
10:56 p.m. - Skarvan out updates information regarding previously observed light at 270 °, the light flashes and weaker
22: 56 - Skarvan report amber lights under cloud cover, just above the horizon in the camera in the east, 45 °
10:58 p.m. - Skarvan updates information regarding the recently observed light image 718
10:59 p.m. - Øyungen report to misalignment of the cameras, which resulted in unclear pictures, but this was adjusted and the camera will take images of decreasing flashes
10:59 p.m. - Øyungen emits Weather Report where the temperature is 6.9 ° C, relative humidity is 87%, the wind speed is 1.4 m / s, the wind direction is south, atmospheric pressure is 904.9 hPa and radioactivity is 0.10 μSv
11:01 p.m. - Skarvan emits Weather report where the temperature is 5.4 ° C, relative humidity is 93%, the wind speed is 3.4 m / s, air pressure is 1003.8 hPa and radioactivity is 0.10 μSv
11:06 p.m. - Øyungen report difficulties with spektralkameraet
23 : 09 - Øyungen inside report observed red and blue flashes of light against Skarvanstoppen
11:10 p.m. - Øyungen elaborates on previously reported activity and specifies that the flashes were not observed against Skarvanstoppen, but across the river to the right of Skarvanstoppen
11:12 p.m. - Øyungen report high activity on Inspire
11:15 p.m. - Øyungen report activity on image 0401NEF on camera against Skarvanstoppen
11:21 p.m. - Øyungen report that spektralkamera now functioning
11:23 p.m. - Skarvan reports that Anna-Lena and Bjorn Gitle goes down to Øyungen
11:23 p.m. - Skarvan report the use of powerful, red lanterns
11:31 p.m. - Notifies about weak aurora to the northwest and north
11:34 p.m. - Øyungen report a white light on spektralkamera on the mountainside towards Skarvann, image 0804NEF
11:35 p.m. - Øyungen reports varied patterns in electronegativity on Inspire
11:36 p.m. - Øyungen reports many small flash of light on the mountainside towards Skarvan, and signal the possibility that this was captured on their camera
11:38 p.m. - Øyungen reports that recent observed flashes of light were red lamps on the photos
11:39 p.m. - Skarvan reports that recently exploited batteries in camera east, fish-eye does not work anymore
11:40 p.m. - Øyungen report that they have taken a picture of two red flashes of light, probably this Hessdalfenomenet, photo number 0425
23 42 - Øyungen reports that two previously reported flashes of light probably is not the phenomenon anyway, but they may have captured more flashes
11:45 p.m. - Øyungen reports about ongoing activity against Skarvan, but with reduced intensity
11:46 p.m. - Øyungen announces two images with suspicious activity, numbering 0430 and 0431 on camera in northeast
11:51 p.m. - Øyungen reports that previously reported activity is due to one of their teams with torches
11:52 p.m. - Øyungen report one white, blue and red angular beacon against Skarvan as river
23:57 - Erling Josefina leaving HK
23:58 - Øyungen emits Weather Report, where the temperature is 6.3 ° C, relative humidity is 83%, the wind speed is 1.7 m / s, the wind direction is southeast , air pressure is 905.3 hPa and radioactivity is 0.5 μSv
11:59 p.m. - Skarvan reports into a white little faint flashes of light with a continuous spectrum below the horizon, 180
0:00 - Øyungen reports into a light at Hessjøen, assumed that it was car but the light was shut down and could therefore not be a car
0:02 - Øyungen reports that bear Gitle and Anna-Lena has arrived Øyungen
0:02 - Skarvan reports into a light that first flashed strongly stood still flashed again, then it was gone -> This was repeated several times
0:04 - Skarvan reports that previously reported flashes of light at Hessjøen not be a cottage because it is too weak and can not be vehicles because it blinks, the light has continuous light spectrum and they assume that they can be the phenomenon
0:05 - Skarvan emits Weather Report where the temperature is 4.9 ° C, relative humidity is 92%, the wind speed is 3.7 m / s, the wind direction is north, air pressure is 1003.8 hPa and radioactivity of 0.07 μSv
00:07 - Information provided by Skarvan regarding light by water has been corrected, the light was 140 °
0:10 - Øyungen report suspicious activity on Inspire
0:11 - Skarvan reports light 215 ° over Øyungen (water), weak flashing
0:13 - Skarvan report that recently reported light is back and flashes
0:15 - Skarvan report much fog
0:16 - Øyungen report high activity on Inspire
0:25 - Skarvan reports that previously reported light on Øyungen (water) has disappeared
0:28 - Øyungen inside reports that Øyungen out there have got new pictures, and are confident that it is the phenomenon they have captured the images
0:29 - Øyungen inside clarifies that Øyungen out at least 10 images of the probable phenomenon
0:48 - Skarvan report that the fog is back
0:50 - Øyungen emits Weather Report, where the temperature is 5 , 1 ° C, relative humidity is 88%, difficulty indifisere wind speed and wind direction, air pressure is 905.3 hPa, radioactivity of 0.10 μSv
0:54 - Øyungen built reports that Øyungen out reports that there is almost no wind out
0:59 - Skarvan report beautiful northern lights
0:59 - Øyungen announces a beautiful aurora
01:00 - Skarvan inside emits Weather Report, where the temperature is 4.3 ° C, humidity 93%, air velocity is 3.4 m / s, the wind direction is located, the air pressure is 1003.7 hPa, radioactivity is 0.11 μSv
1:07 - Roger going down to HK
1:08 - Rating Evan inform us that their camera in the east does not work, due luftfujtighet
1:13 - Skarvan inform us about was observed white flashes that lit brightly and looked weaker in the direction north-east
1:15 - Øyungen built reports that Øyungen looking observe two strong white and blue flashes of light in the direction southwest
1:16 - Skarvan report that their camera in the north took a picture of a yellow oval light that is present in an image but lost on the next one, which probably is a sign that this light phenomenon
1:17 - Øyungen ever are registering with more information regarding the two recently observed the flashes: the two flashes of light took place at intervals of 15 seconds
1:19 - Skarvan report thick fog limiting their powers of observation
1:20 - Øyungen reports about thick fog
1:23 - Øyungen inside report information from Øyungen out: in recent images will be seen rødgult light that almost lit up the trees around them, and also white lyglimt in the form of streaks, these lights were perceived on several cameras direction northeast
1:25 - Roger arriving HK
1:28 - fog on Skarvan is not fog, but low clouds
1:33 - Øyungen report that it understood is lysaktivitet below the horizon
1:44 - Skarvan out reports that the cloud still keeping you in observing
1:45 - Skarvan report that they have taken the camera west
1:53 - Øyungen emits Weather report where the temperature is 3.9 ° C, humidity 91%, air velocity is 8.6 m / s, the wind direction is south, air pressure is 904.5 hPa, radioactivity 0.11 μSv
1:59 - Skarvan has lowered their cameras
1:59 - Skarvan inside emits Weather Report, where the temperature is 5.1 ° C, humidity 94%, air velocity is 6.5 m / s, the wind direction is located, the air pressure is 1001 hPa, radioaktivitete n is 0.08 μSv
2:00 - Skarvan report continued thick fog and therefore takes team evening and concludes observance
2:09 - Øyungen take down all the cameras because of little activity, except manual camera that is placed down at the gravel pit
2:13 - Øyungen continuing to observe
2:15 - Øyungen report that Inspire is out of power and is no longer available, without any possibility of charging
2:22 - HK emits Weather report, where the temperature is 6.9 ° C, humidity 88%, air velocity is 0.6 m / s , the wind direction is east, the air pressure is 921 hPa, radioactivity is unknown
2:23 - Øyungen report that their camera in northwest soon go out of power
2:25 - Øyungen ever report that the activity is not as frequent as before
2:27 - Øyungen out report observed red flashes of light approaching the hill
2:33 - Øyungen report that activity has decreased significantly and they intend to give up in a short time
2:37 - Øyungen report that they have to turn off the screen showing a northwesterly direction due . too little power
02:42 - Øyungen inside reports about problems with the camera in the Northeast, concludes that there is no need to replace the battery in terms of planned dismantling kl.03
02:44 - Øyungen emits Weather Report with temperature of 3.6 ° C, humidity is 93%, the wind speed is 12.2 m / s, wind direction is northeast, the air pressure is 904.2 hPa, the radioactivity is 0.09 μSv
2:48 - Øyungen outside and inside concludes observation
2:52 - HK takes the evening and end the session
Columnist: Unexplained Mysteries
The Hassdalen Lights are an unexplained phenomenon involving mysterious light anomalies observed over the valley of Hassdalen in Norway, sightings have occured since the 1940s and while several potential hypotheses exist to explain them ( including a connection of the UFO phenomenon ) and despite a long-running research effort named 'Project Hessdalen' the case still remains something of a mystery. In his investigations of the phenomenon recently UM member 'The L' spoke to astrophysicst and university physics lecturer Dr. Massimo Teodorani and provided the following interview on the topic of the lights
L:…Skeptics told me that the Hessdalen phenomenon is just some new exotic plasma.
Massimo Teodorani: OK, I start to answer to your questions from here. It is very important that research on Hessdalen-like phenomena is not affected by disinformation, fantasies, exploitations (in favor of a theory or another, in particular the ETH one), bad digestion and so on. I frankly do not belong to the category of “believers” in something; I only try my best with the intent of exploring what is not yet clear in the facts of the Nature that surrounds us. I am only interested in the objectivity of facts and I am confident in the capability of physics to describe these facts using numbers and reasoning.
L: Also I must say I respect your work very very much. In good hope that you will answer my questions I will be free to ask you:
Massimo Teodorani: Thank you. I will try to be complete and pertinent in my answers. If I answered to your questions with excessive “certainty” I would not be sincere and/or objective towards the facts. There are still several gaps in our knowledge concerning the physics of the problem represented by Hessdalen-like phenomena.
L: 1. Is it proven that 95% of Hessdalen phenomena are plasma? Or are we still talking about UFOs? I read that conclusion of the research was that "...its behavior most often unpredictable." And unknown origin.
Massimo Teodorani: The behavior that emerged from our measurements during several years shows to us a phenomenon that is substantially plasma that anyway shows unusual characteristics. I have explained in my JSE paper the reasons of this. The question of “ufo” is vague and irrelevant to the phenomenology encountered there. Although only a part of Hessdalen phenomenology is explained, I would like to concentrate more on what we are sure it happens effectively and that has been ascertained by objective observations.
Of course this research would have never been possible without the pioneering work carried out by Østfold College professors Erling Strand and Bjørn Gitle Hauge, who, in addition to installing a permanent measuring station in Hessdalen since 15 years and to promoting an important initiative for the scientific education of students who need to understand strong and clear how the investigative methodology works in this field, were able to catalyze and focalize the interest of several scientists everywhere in the world. Such an approach of course deserves a great appreciation, as well as similar approaches by serious scholars of several branches elsewhere in the world such as physicist Dr. Harley Rutledge in Piedmont, Missouri (USA), NASA aerospace engineer James Bunnell in Marfa, Texas (USA), geophysicist Marsha Adams of the International Earthlight Alliance (IEA, USA), anthropologist Dr. Diego Escolar in Argentina, and several others. Initiatives carried out by the NARCAP organization in USA, the UAP Observations Reporting Scheme in Europe, the GEIPAN in France, and the CIPH in Italy deserve a special mention, together with individual scientists of the “ball lightning” phenomenon from several countries in the world. All of these persons and groups, although being often different from each other, are united by the common methodologies of rigorous and open minded approach and by the same goal that is constituted by innovation in science, in particular fundamental physics.
L: 2. Is it possible that we see one more documentary about Hessdalen phenomena?
Massimo Teodorani: I might advice to see this relatively recent (2007) and brief movie of light phenomena taken by Prof. Bjørn Gitle Hauge and his students:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zL3d0LvJXtA
I do not feel like to show you long documentaries on Hessdalen, as in my opinion, too much speculation on “ufos” is almost always present there (even if mixed up with something scientific), and this may manipulate the critical thinking of people. I do not think that such documentaries are really useful to promote scientific research in this field. Moreover, I think that the mixture of popular “UFO” stories (even a tiny bit of them) with science discredits the second. Anyway, you’ll see very many of them on Youtube and elsewhere, your choice.
L: 3. How would you explain that suspected self regulating mechanism for temperature? Is it possible that plasma have that mechanism?
Massimo Teodorani: Our work (at least mine) consisted not in wildly theorizing but mostly in trying to describe technically what our instruments were seeing and how the derived physical parameters were correlated together. This is a standard operation in Astronomy: describing quantitatively what Nature shows. Astrophysics then attempts to apply the law of physics to what is accurately coded by observational results in order to interpret this quantitative description. Doing hard physics is very difficult and probably still premature in the Hessdalen case, so far. Anyway, yes, a few quite solid work-hypotheses have been formulated, but still a long time of work will be necessary in order to build up a perfectly coherent picture of what happens there and at least in other 50 similar locations in the world. All this, will much depend much on the available funding for research, and the one available right now is extremely low, if not nothing.
Concerning a purely technical description of light phenomena and according to my analysis of the past years (see my JSE paper, mostly), after taking some spectra and after looking how luminosity varies, I noticed that such light phenomena tend to maintain a constant temperature while their luminosity varies. Normally plasma tends to expand, so that this would cause a quite quick cooling of the plasma itself: consequently a ball of light (caused by that plasma) should turn off very quickly due to sudden temperature’s drop out. This doesn’t happen in the Hessdalen phenomena that I studied some years ago. I also would expect that as soon as the light ball expands the cooling process should produce a reddening of the color. This does not happen. Therefore, trying to interpret what the technical description shows (we have the duty to let Nature speak for itself before theorizing), what came out is that the increase of luminosity is not due to a volumetric expansion of the plasma sphere but rather to the sudden apparition of many secondary spheres around a common barycentre: this, which is not due to a cooling process driven by adiabatic inflation, increases the dimensions of the radiating surface and consequently increases luminosity as the square of the surface radius, being temperature maintained constant. This situation occurs all the time by showing “on” and “off” states on a rate of few seconds or less, which determine Hessdalen lights’ semi-regular pulsations, namely: luminosity variations. In nature, we didn’t see anything such before. But we have the duty to record what we see and then try to interpret this. Of course observations should be repeated many times by different observers using the same instruments. We know for sure that the same mechanism of light variation occurs also in phenomena that are reported in other parts of the world, where this very particular behavior has been documented by video using zoom and also by visual sightings: in all cases it is possible to see “a cluster of lights very close together” that changes all the time, sometimes reaching very high luminosity peaks.
In some cases the visual phenomenology can be explained as car headlights (when seen from far away) whose light is subject to a diffraction phenomenon due to close trees (respect to the observer), or whose light is distorted by particularly reflecting and concave terrains, or whose light is subject to several refraction effects such as mirage and Fata Morgana. For instance, the investigation that was carried out a few years ago in this specific direction by Prof. John Pettigrew with the Australian Min-min lights is truly sound. In other cases this prosaic explanation doesn’t hold water at all but is just a pure invention or a trick (I would like to call it: “anti-hoax”) to stop research on this field by attempting to close it using very ordinary, simplistic, superficial, lazy, thoughtless, inappropriate and sometimes dishonest explanations.
L: 4. I learnt that white plasma and red plasma can’t coexist but in the Hessdalen case they coexist. How?
Massimo Teodorani: According to an hypothesis, the color of the lights is not due to temperature but to the effect of mold spores coming from the ground and suspended in the air, which act differently as “quantum dots” on the (normally white) plasma balls that suddenly occur. We have seen white, red and sometimes blue light balls of the same dimensions coexisting together. If the reason of the redder color were due to cooling of the ball we would see much bigger diameters and a quick disappearance but so it doesn’t happen. All the balls show to have approximately the same dimensions.
L: Is that proof that we don’t talk about plasma?
Massimo Teodorani: No. We think it is plasma indeed, but rather a plasma form having very specific and peculiar behavior whose main characteristics is the ability to self-regulate just like a sort of thermodynamic natural machine. How does this happen? Well, in the Hessdalen case, most probably high humidity and aerosols have an important role in confining the plasma ball itself into a sharply spherical shape. This occurs due to inward forces of electrochemical nature (induced by water vapor; see my JSE paper) starting from the external surface that prevent the sphere from expanding and cooling: this makes so that light balls last quite a long time sometimes, without substantial heat loss. The occurrence of many spheres together in sort of clusters of spheres as well as secondary ball ejections are probably driven by electrostatic mechanisms, surface tension effects and energy minimization that requires the formation of new spheres in order to maintain a thermodynamic balance (a sort of “energy sharing” split in several components). This is still a work hypothesis, not yet the definitive theory. We need more observations and much more work to ascertain this interpretation. But we think this is the most probable one considering, in particular, the geophysical and meteorological conditions that are ongoing in Hessdalen. Of course copper and other metal abundances underground play an important role there in conducing electricity, which is in its turn most probably produced by piezoelectricity from underground: we think that piezoelectricity itself is the starting trigger of the formation of plasma balls. As once Prof. Hauge was suggesting to me, it is possible that piezoelectricity, as a main trigger mechanism to produce plasma balls, is induced by the compression of rocks underground in a very peculiar and unusual way. This compression is suspected to be induced not by seismicity in the specific Hessdalen case but rather by river water that after penetrating into the many holes present there freezes and then compresses the rocks together.
The hypothesis concerning the confining mechanism of Hessdalen light balls is but one hypothesis, not the definitive theory. But we arrived at this interpretation also thanks to the skills and experience of physical chemists of the value of Dr. David Turner, who is also an expert of ball lightning. I think that ball lightning is just a sort of “relative” of Hessdalen balls, which is scaled down in dimensions and lifetime. The electrochemical confining mechanism doesn’t exclude at all different physical interpretations concerning ball lightning and Hessdalen lights, but I think that it is the most pertinent one to the specific Hessdalen case. Several other models concerning the way in which a light ball works have been proposed. For instance, nuclear physicist Dr. David Fryberger elaborated a very sophisticated theoretical model (including its predicted observable parameters) which assumes that the nucleus of the light balls is produced by magnetic monopoles arranged in a particular configuration called “vorton”, others think of mini-black holes as a confining mechanism and central physical force, others think of “plasma vortex” models of several kinds, and finally others think of a particular manifestation of energy extraction from the so called “zero point field” of quantum mechanics. They are all very brilliant theories, but their predictions, in my opinion, are not sufficiently able to match realistically the observations in the specific Hessdalen case. But they might explain similar light phenomena that occur in other parts of the world, as I believe that a “unifying physical mechanism” for such plasma phenomena doesn’t exist. According to the specific geological, geophysical and meteorological conditions (including a possible contribution by cosmic rays and solar activity) of a given territory we might have a physical mechanism in favor of another and/or mechanisms that are a mixture of several processes. In fact, from the geological point of view, the places in the world where anomalous light phenomena show themselves in a (apparently) very similar way are most often very different from each other.
What we know for sure and in spite of the differences in the possible plasma confining mechanisms, after interpreting our technically coded observations, is that all of such “light balls”, including the much smaller and shorter lasting ball lightning, exist in that shape because two main forces are acting together just like in a balance: one outward pressure force and one inward central force (a star, for instance, substantially works exactly in this way), probably accompanied with possible rotating plasma vortexes and, in some cases, magnetic field amplification. We also know, due to the law of conservation of magnetic flux, that if a plasma collapses towards the center the local magnetic field may be highly amplified: this should explain strong readings acquired using a magnetometer that have been recorded in the past in several places of the world while such light phenomena were appearing.
Anyway this is still an open field of investigation. We’ll be totally sure of our interpretations only when we’ll be able to reproduce them in a laboratory. Some shy but brilliant attempts in this very sense have already been done by other researchers, such as Dr. Gerson Paiva in Brazil for instance, and others elsewhere in the world. But much more work has to be done yet. At the present time we are pretty sure of what the observations show when they are submitted to a technical representation and measurements. A definitive theory (more theories, probably) for the specific cases in which anomalous light phenomena occur in the world, has still to come.
L: 5. What about that 5% Hessdalen unsolved case? Is in that percentage just “solid objects” or also plasma with sharp geometric shapes? Do you think that it is another phenomenon? How can plasma have sharp geometric shape?
Massimo Teodorani: This is still an unsolved problem. At present we can only take note of it but we have not yet a rigorous physical theory able to explain it. And of course we do not know how these very particular shapes can match the much more standard spherical one within the same physical mechanism. What we know is that some of these geometric shapes have been surrounded sometimes by smaller spheres in the same clustering mode reported before. We suspect that this is a part of the same phenomenon, but we cannot explain it yet and so far, not even using work hypotheses. I like to think, anyway, that as snow is composed of very geometric snowflakes, maybe also plasmas in particular conditions can form a similar geometric structure: after all, like physicist David Bohm noticed once, plasmas are extremely “cooperative” structures, meaning that electrons and ions do not behave independently but rather collectively within an intrinsic order dictated by electrical forces inside. This happens without any need to think that snowflakes or plasmas are intelligent or that they represent “portals from somewhere”. These are also possibilities, of course, but they are still too exotic to be considered seriously as true scientific work hypotheses. Anyway, the still very exotic question of “intelligence within a plasma formation”, as a possible consequence of “plasma life forms”, has been recently examined by me, within the framework of researches that have been published by other researchers, which show that in particular conditions plasmas may behave like a life form. I will discuss this delicate issue at the end of this interview.
L: 6. Ejecting mini balls to even 100 meters. Is plasma able to that? What is reason for that behavior?
Massimo Teodorani: In addition to the possible causes that I discussed in a previous answer to a question of yours, it may be well due to electrostatic forces. In some cases electric charge may cause suddenly separated structures within a plasma concentration. We think that the ejected balls are a part of a previously formed cluster. According to the charge positivity or negativity also the opposite process may occur.
L: 7. Also that balls in some cases join together in triangular shape. If plasma why is doing this? Is there any case before Hessdalen that plasma join in triangular shape?
Massimo Teodorani: It may be a pure coincidence in most cases. I think that this has nothing to do with “triangular UFOs” that are seen quite often in the world, and which, I am very sure, probably represent the product of a new technology coming from us (not from “them”). That’s another reason why since a decade I have been cataloguing practically all of human aerospace technology (see: http://www.wikio.it/article/97033647 ), including UAV and UCAV drones that have spherical, disc and rhomboidal shapes. These flying machines do exist and many of them are operational, and the ones that I know so far do not fly using “electrogravitics”. If I wanted to maintain a certain project secret I would fly and test such drones just over areas where strange lights are seen most often: everyone would think that they come from aliens, but we, expert in aeronautics too, do not fall into this trap. This does not mean that we totally exclude the possibility of alien visitations: science imposes us to be open minded but also that we have to describe rigorously what we see and not let our fantasy make Pindaric flights. If this is the case, well, then it will be Science to tell the last word.
L: 8. How is it possible that we capture phenomena on the radar yet it was invisible to our eyes? The light phenomenon often shows strong radar tracks, including when it is optically faint or almost invisible. In some cases in which it is visible, it shows no radar track. Is plasma able to do that? Seems to me that phenomenon have some switch "off" and "on”.
Massimo Teodorani: We can radar-track a plasma structure also when it is not visible. The plasma might occasionally emit in the infrared, we are sure of that, as we noticed some lights that disappeared to the sight but were still perfectly visible when using a night vision system. This may suggest to us that a “plasma bubble” may be strong and dense in the infrared state at certain phases, while at other phases it may brighten in the optical range due to several occasional energy-exciting factors (one of which might be piezoelectricity).
The reason of disappearance of the radar track while the phenomenon is visible can be explained by the fact that the light phenomenon, although extremely luminous, at that time is not in the range of the used radar. It might be very far away from the radar detection system. In some cases it may be visible at a distance of more than 50 Km while the range of the used radar there can be often less. It may be explained also by transient and drastic changes of the radar cross-section of the phenomenon, possibly due to an occasional decrease of plasma density.
Of course I know: UFO hunters like to think that this is “shape-shifting” of alien airships or alike and that Hessdalen is just a “portal”. But we have NO proof that this is what happens really. Of course we cannot exclude totally this possibility; otherwise we would go against the explorative and impartial investigative approach of science. But we cannot consider it so far, at least until we’ll accumulate enough measurable and recordable observations in the same way in which we did when we monitored more standard phenomena in Hessdalen and elsewhere. Yes, I can confirm that, apart from the strange geometries of plasmas that occasionally are seen there, something else sometimes overlaps. But we have no sufficient data in this sense in order to even venture a work hypothesis. We cannot exclude the possible action of military UAV or UCAV drones in those areas, but we cannot prove it as well so far. This is still an open problem. Exceptional claims need exceptional proofs, and in this part of the research we do not have those proofs yet, but rather mostly witnesses from people, who in most cases may (innocently) mix what they see with their fantasy and their lack of knowledge of unusual natural phenomena and new aerospace experimental projects: of course they are totally justified, and their sincerity in what they reported is, wholly, out of question.
L: 9. Is it possible that plasma can land on the ground?
Massimo Teodorani: Well, the ground is a basic triggering factor in this kind of phenomenon. In fact we call it “earthlight”; a term coined by US geophysicist Marsha Adams of International Earthlight Alliance. Differently from ball lightning whose origin is mostly triggered by atmospheric weather, earthlights such as Hessdalen ones are just born from the ground, mostly due to piezoelectricity or triboluminescence. In many cases seismic shocks can amplify this phenomenon, and “earthlights” become “seismic lights”. In other cases, such as in Hessdalen, possible piezoelectric mechanisms are triggered and amplified by other causes. One hypothesis, such as the one proposed a few years ago by investigators of the Brown Mountain light phenomena in USA, might be that mountains that are particularly rich with quartz and hematite (just two examples of rocks) can cause piezoelectricity during the night due to the very simple fact that, especially in summertime, at daytime the stones tend to expand while at nighttime they tend to contract due to the daily temperature gradient: this can cause piezoelectricity or similar phenomena. I think I have been repeatedly a witness of the possible consequences of such a phenomenon, when looking in summer at Pietra di Bismantova (a famous big rock located in the Northern Apennine, Italy) after 21:00 some flickers or flashes of light were punctually appearing just over the top of that little mountain. Together with a colleague of mine, I saw identical effects looking at other mountains too in our Apennine, in summer and always after sunset. The strong suspicion here is that those flickers and flashes might occasionally act as the “seeds” for the formation of much bigger and long-lasting plasma balls (as it sometimes happens there), exactly like the ones reported in Hessdalen.
So here the definition is not: “plasma balls landing on the ground”, but rather “plasma balls that are created by the ground” due to purely geophysical mechanisms and subsequent interactions with the local atmosphere. In fact most of these lights are seen, everywhere in the world (such as also in Marfa, Texas, very well investigated cases by aerospace engineer James Bunnell), very close to the ground and only sometimes in full sky. Unfortunately the fact that these light phenomena mostly occur at very low height, inevitably creates a lot of confusion with car headlights, cottage lights, streetlights, flashlights, fires, mirages, etc. Experts who know very well those territories are obviously able to distinguish the signal from the noise, non-experts – deluded individuals on one side and alleged “skepticals” with zero experience on the opposite side – are not able to make any distinction, thus creating some disturb to this research and inducing “controversies” that do not exist at all in reality. Scientists go ahead in exploration.
As I have seen from your Forum that some of you also posted some links that are pertinent to the above mentioned “artificial controversies”, I think I should complete them with these two updated papers, hoping you enjoy even more:
http://www.scienzaemistero.com/2007/pdf/Anomalistik_Teodorani.pdf (also published in German as: Teodorani, M. (2007). Hessdalen-Lichtphänomene und die Inkonsistenzen der Autoscheinwerfer-Deutung. Zeitschrift für Anomalistik. Fortgesetzte Diskussionen. Band 7 (2007), Nr. 3, pp. 286-299.)
http://www.earthlights.org/pdf/triangulation.pdf (from a third party who was present in 2002 during our observations in Hessdalen)
L: 10. What about that preceded by very short-lasting flashes? Did you include that when you made conclusions? I read that there was reports of flashes even 5 meters from observers before they seen phenomenon.
Massimo Teodorani: Yes, it happened sometimes. It seems that those flashes are sort of “seeds”, which precede the real phenomenon. But only a few are able to make a true ball of light. As I discussed in my previous answer, such a “flickering phenomenology” is seen in many other places too.
L: 11. Is it true that light phenomenon is able to release spherical iron particles onto the ground?
Massimo Teodorani: I found indeed such particles, and this resulted from a comparison with control samples around and underground. Anyway this might have been a pure coincidence. In fact, in order to give more power to this finding we should have had the luck to find at least 10 more other similar findings, so that statistics should have enforced the possibility that under some circumstances plasma phenomena may release such particles (similar findings have been also found after some researchers a few years ago carried out laboratory experiments on cold fusion, and where a plasma ball was transiently formed inside the reactor). So, far we cannot reach any conclusive inference on this specific issue, except for taking a note of it (which is a duty every scientist should have, in spite of hiding uncomfortable data). Moreover we cannot even exclude that what we found is simple meteoric powder that by chance fell onto the big stone from where we collected samples at the exact point on which a witness told us that a light ball was over it.
L: 12. What about that Doppler VLF noise? I heard that others type of plasma can make that sound. Like sprites.
Massimo Teodorani: I do not know if sprites and elves are related in some way with Hessdalen-like phenomena. I think that a statistics on the number of both phenomena might suggest something in this way, but, at the best of my knowledge, so far this possible correlation has not been searched yet.
Concerning VLF data, we didn’t record just noise but rather unexplained electromagnetic signals in that specific range, which manifested a clear Doppler effect showing semi-periodic inversions from low to high frequency and vice versa. Another problem here was that at that specific time we almost never had light phenomena in sight. Nevertheless, after comparing the shape of those strange signals with well known much more typical ionospheric and manmade signals, I still have not been able to find a match between such prosaic signals and the anomalous ones found sometimes in Hessdalen. I strongly suspect that those specific VLF signals that we recorded are indeed unusual and that their behavior might be interpreted as a spinning plasma sphere having a very specific mechanism, which was not anyway visible to us, possibly because such phenomena live most of their time in the infrared.
L: 13. After researchers done laser test they felt like in boat. Did you ever measure low-frequency EM-field?
Massimo Teodorani: Yes, since at least 5 years I am carrying out VLF-ELF measurements practically every year, mostly in my nation (but I have done them in Ontario, Canada too, one year ago), in places where anomalous light phenomena are often seen, such as in the Sibillini Mountains in Central Italy and also 50 Km south of where I live in the southern part of Northern Italy (locations from west to east: Solignano, Pietra di Bismantova / Castelnovo nè Monti, Casalbono), North Apennines. My VLF-receiver is able to record on the field (normally during a time period of 5 hours, considering computer battery); it is much more sensible than a simple Inspire receiver but uses a simple dipole wire-antenna. I have a quite large databank of well known ionospheric, manmade and receiver-generated signals, which I can quickly compare with unidentified signals that sometimes (very rarely) appear in my recordings. And of course I always and constantly consult prominent specialists in the VLF-ELF field such as for instance Renato Romero of VLF.it .
The problem here is that, so far, considering also the long-lasting VLF-ELF monitoring activity carried out in Hessdalen in the past years – using a very sophisticated antenna projected by Eng. Stelio Montebugnoli and his collaborators of INAF – I have never been so lucky to record at the same time anomalous light phenomena in sight and well defined anomalous VLF-ELF signals: unfortunately I just recorded them separately so far. Therefore my strategy in screening and selecting anomalous signals of this kind is based on their simultaneity with possible light phenomena in sight. Of course, in this way we are immediately able to time-correlate such VLF-ELF signals to the light anomaly itself. On the contrary I can only take note of strange VLF-ELF signals and record them in my archive, considering as a work hypothesis the (still undemonstrated) possibility that they are created by momentarily invisible plasma balls or by the geophysical effects due to the territory itself: these ones are anyway important data to be collected, and which might reveal to be of great importance in a further phase as a “comparison template” as soon as we are so lucky to record VLF-ELF signals at the same time in which visual light phenomena appear. Anyway some VLF signals seem to “speak alone” in terms of possible spinning plasma balls: as soon as we’ll record them visually too then we’ll have a smoking gun of concrete scientific relevance. And then more questions will be raised… This research is like a play of “treasure hunting”: you find a slip of paper with indications, which in its turn addresses one to the next slip of paper and so on. I do not think anyway it will be a never ending story.
The VLF-ELF part of this research is extremely important also due to other reasons: such kind of electromagnetic emission, according to lab experiments carried out by Dr. Michael Persinger in Canada in the past years, is able to induce not only physiological effects such as sensations of “faintness” (like to be in a boat), but also hallucinations. It may also be that many of the alleged sightings of light phenomena and/or “UFO” somewhere in the world are just hallucination effects induced by VLF-ELF emission from particular areas of geophysical interest, or that light phenomena themselves that are effectively in sight are able to produce this kind of electromagnetic field. In such a way the witness would report a reality that may be (respectively) totally or partially altered by hallucination effects.
This is a very important investigation, anyway. Another important piece of a puzzle that must be studied extremely carefully.
Some epistemological considerations here. We do not know yet how the model concerning light balls described in a previous answer can match VLF and magnetic data, but we are obliged to take everything into account and then attempt to improve the current model on light balls or even change it drastically: of course science never speaks of “absolute truths” but only of “provisional truths” that can be improved by a procedure based on subsequent approximations and on an extremely careful attention to any possible new detail that reality shows to us. Science, as you see, is a dialectic process, not tales or religion. Of course as soon as we see a manifestation of nature from the data of our observations, once we are able to eliminate any source of (internal and external) noise, our duty is to build up work hypotheses: this is the dynamic process of scientific inquire. These work hypotheses are the only means able to drive our next steps. If we do not do this, all instrumental data are totally sterile and useless. We use instruments only with the goal in mind of constructing physics from what observations show. We are ready to improve and or change the picture, and, in case, to verify if and how some gaps are present inside our knowledge of “standard physics”. This doesn’t mean at all that our physics is wrong: not at all. Our generally accepted standard physics is indeed correct, as we can verify this extremely well. But this doesn’t exclude that it may be incomplete. We have to try to fill that gap, and anomalies have been always our best chance to do this. If we do not do this, then we’ll leave this gap in the hands of “pseudoscience”, “new age”, “esotericism”, “alienology” or even “religious fanaticism”, which may be extremely dangerous because they can make people lose their capability of critical thinking and consequently their freedom. Of course, whatever may come out from this research, as a prerequisite, is necessarily submitted to rationality, internal coherence and logic. I am perfectly sure that even the strangest fact of Nature must obey logical rules, even if, in case, they may expand and/or revolutionize our knowledge. At the present time we are simply trying to search for some anomalous manifestations of Nature and use them as pieces of a much bigger puzzle, whose overall picture we are trying to build up. And of course we have really no convenience in making a fun of ourselves or of others.
L: 14. Did you ever discuss sighting reports of other people inside Science community? Did you discuss any of these sightings?
“1.Bjorn Holden saw egg shape light moving toward his house. When egg shape light was above his house it illuminated room through the roof.
2.Bjorn and Bjarne Lillevold saw big black vertical “stick” with green lights above automatic station.
3.Anders, Birgitta and Linn Berglund saw white cigar shape object with black lines across the body.
4.Anonymus saw oval object same colors as a fire and big as tree.
5. Hallfrid Lillevold saw two lights merged and became one light.
6.Randi Aspas Moe and Terje Hasvoldseter saw big light which split in four parts. All four parts were oblong up and down. Later these four lights became one big yellow light with green, red and blue balls around it.”
Massimo Teodorani: Yes, I have read many of these reports, which are quite constantly posted on the Project Hessdalen website, and sometimes interviewed myself some of the persons living in the Hessdalen valley and in similar places in the world, including Center-North Italy. Nevertheless, they are just witness cases having no sufficient elements to allow a serious consideration by the scientific community, but they might of some importance for serious ufologists, who in their turn might help scientists in their investigations.
I personally think that such witnesses are mostly sincere (in Hessdalen I have known three quite reserved persons who were looking sincere indeed). But I also think that, in total good faith, they just describe the “plasma phenomenon” that often occurs in Hessdalen and in several other similar locations in the world, which can show itself sometimes in very large dimensions and also close to houses. Having an electrostatic charge the phenomenon may be “attracted” by houses where several electromagnetic devices (radio, TV, antennas, household appliances, etc…) are normally working.
I think that in almost all the reported cases people tend to “fantasize” what they see in good faith: it is a psychological effect that is often triggered and can happen to everyone. I also think that the electromagnetic field the phenomenon produces, especially if it is emitted in low frequency, may induce hallucination states in the mind of people, so that possibly what effectively happened around them may be altered by a neurological factor. These are hypotheses that do not lessen the sincerity of witnesses in telling these facts. Unfortunately these witnesses add very little to scientific investigation but certainly do increase statistics of the area. But, at least in the Hessdalen case, I believe that these witnesses have been chosen sufficiently well thanks to the long-dated expertise of Erling Strand.
L: 15. How far did SETV project gone in Hessdalen? Is there any new momentum in that direction (possible exogenous probes)?
Massimo Teodorani: I don’t go to Hessdalen since 2002; my engineer and technician ex-collaborators do go there almost every year for a few days in order to fix monitoring instruments. I have changed my monitored areas elsewhere (in Italy and abroad). SETV? Of course that is but one hypothesis among others, if we assume that “something else” may overlap with a more general plasma phenomenon. Apart from strangely geometric shaped plasma seen sometimes in the valley, something “structured” have been also seen. We also did see two or three of that kind there, even if the sightings were so unexpected and fast that there was not enough time to activate instruments. Lack of funding for this research prevents us to make appropriate monitoring using very sophisticated instruments. The problem is obviously open and leaves space to future investigations if researchers will be put in a condition to dedicate much more of their time in carrying out monitoring actions directly on the field using apparatuses that are much more advanced and completely equipped than the ones that are commonly used by the Norwegian Automatic Measurement Station (which are good in themselves, but not enough complete due to lack of funding, I guess). Of course I have ready projects concerning the SETV aspect too. Ten years ago I just wanted to fix the methodology, such as for instance in this paper:
http://www.itacomm.net/ph/phdata_e.pdf
The idea is still up-to-date in itself, of course.
L: 16. Can you tell us something new about phenomenan? Any news? Or can you tell us something interesting. Some new sightings. New theory.
Massimo Teodorani: Please, see later my answer to your last question.
L: 17. From your papers I conclude that science still don’t say for sure that Hessdalen phenomena are plasma because:
“1-Hessdalen phenomenon in both a photometric and spectroscopic sense does not have the characteristics typical of a classic plasma of free electrons and ions.
2-If it can explain successfully the observed luminosity profiles, cannot be considered to explain Hessdalen-like phenomena or earth lights in general; it cannot explain the external electric cause that generates these light balls.
3-If the illuminated matter were a classical thermal plasma, two main after-effects would be predicted:
1) gradual cooling due to adiabatic expansion (no energy exchange with the surroundings during expansion) or explosion after a very short time (as in the case of some ball-lightning reports), or
2) colorimetric decay with a fast transition from blue or white to red and final disappearance (Fryberger, 1997).
These effects are not seen at all in the Hessdalen phenomenon.
4-The light balls show apparently ‘‘non-thermodynamic’’ characteristics.
5-The observed behavior of these light balls suggests a self-regulating mechanism that keeps the temperature, and hence radiant power, constant in spite of changes in size.
6-The geometric shape found in a minority of light phenomena cannot be explained by any available plasma/ball-lightning theory.
7-The lights turn on and off at a particular point and then sometimes turn on at another point very far away (up to 1 Km or so).
8-If the ball is assumed to be a plasma that expands adiabatically, then the temperature should drop when the volume of the ball increases. The observed behavior of the light balls is different from this prediction. They radiate more power as they increase in size.
9-White balls (very hot,if a plasma) can coexist with red ones (very cool, if a plasma) of the same size,again violating the predicted behavior of a conventional plasma...
10- The standard nature of the plasma,which is predicted to be produced by nuclear fusion inside the spinning lightball, simply cannot explain the observed optical features.
11.Some very-low-brightness objects, often with translucent characteristics and of constant brightness, appear suddenly low in the sky or very close to the trees showing intrinsically geometric shapes, mostly triangular or ellipsoidal.
-Rectangular shapes have been recorded as Well. The reason for these shapes is totally unknown.
12.Ejection of mini light balls. This mechanism is unknown origin. The empirical evidence is that the small balls which can be ejected to a large distance (of the order of 50–100 m) from the large white colored nucleus tend to be green colored, while the small balls which appear to be very close (distance of the order of 2–5 m) to a cluster nucleus tend to be white (high intensity) or red (high intensity) and blue (low intensity) colored. Again the reason for the different colors, which are apparently related to distance from the nuclear region, remains unknown.
Is that outdated? Is that true?
Massimo Teodorani: I am not quite sure of where you took those phrases, possibly from an older paper of mine. They do not seem to be taken from the conclusive part of my 2004 JSE paper, which is still updated today. I think that, so far, the most updated ideas are still presented in my JSE paper published here:
http://www.scientificexploration.org/journal/jse_18_2_teodorani.pdf
Coming now to your questions, as I explained before, these anomalies can reenter into the plasma interpretation anyway, even if the plasma behaves in strange ways.
You can find a (possibly useful) more recent and complete quite dense resume in the first part of this paper of last year:
http://www.narcap.org/Projsphere/2.4-e2-narcap_ProjSph_MaxTeo.pdf
And here you can find “the point of the situation” (dated 2009) which I wanted to show out, in which I discuss where and how we can improve our investigations in this specific field:
http://www.itacomm.net/PH/2009_Teodorani.pdf
(if you look in the references therein, and also in the previous two papers, you can see all the new published papers on this subject)
Hessdalen and several other similar places in the world offer several geophysical conditions where strange phenomena like that may occur in that way. Anyway, not all of the cited points can be explained as a natural phenomenon. In fact I do not exclude some overlap from something else, as well as some other colleagues of mine think. The problem is that we have no concrete proof of this so far. I tried to discuss this aspect in this peer-reviewed paper published by Springer in 2006:
http://openseti.org/Docs/NewSETI_MT_LAKI.pdf
And, I have many doubts that I would ever speak of this with the general public, not even if we demonstrated in case this possibility scientifically. The public tends to alter and exploit this kind of information (there is a strong dangerous emotional component here), and this is very disturbing to the serene continuation of our research. Therefore I decided, so far, that “certain hypotheses” are not discussed publicly any more. They will be discussed only technically whenever and if we’ll obtain data in this sense. The public, in case, will see only cryptic and cold articles. At the same time a good dose of healthy skepticism is absolutely necessary on this side of the question. In fact I recently discussed this concept in this conceptual paper of mine:
http://fierycelt.tripod.com/xposeufotruth/needknow_vs_needbelieve.html
Concerning the more general “UFO” research, one year ago I published this long technical paper:
http://www.narcap.org/reports/CompAnal/ONNYCT_Paper_MT_2009_REVISED.pdf
where I wanted to test if, how and how much “UFO databases” are really effective in addressing us to the “ultimate interpretation”. The results of these calculations and reasoning, though leaving an opened door, as you will see, are wholly quite skeptical.
If that specific interpretation was true, the first authorities that I would advise would be the military (duty of a citizen), then some of my colleagues, but not the public.
Last summer I participated to an “Interrogation on UFOs” at the Euro Parliament in Strasbourg. The initiative was due to Parliamentary Mario Borghezio of the Lega Nord party. I operated as a scientific advisor for Borghezio’s initiative, and possibly new joint actions might be undertaken during the current year. Of course I study the “UFO problem” too since 20 years. If some of you is interested you can then hear the joint press conference and my conference there:
http://www.alfredolissoni.net/pressc.mp3
http://www.alfredolissoni.net/confc.mp3
As well as my role as a NARCAP research associate, you will quickly notice that my approach is substantially skeptical and mostly devoted to the study of anomalous aerial phenomena of natural origin. But you will also notice that I consider the “SETV hypothesis” too. Methodologically SETV is a strict relative of SETI, and they are both born from astronomy, not from ufology.
Moreover, you can’t imagine how many hoaxes and fakes I have discovered so far: this has shown very clearly to me how some “popular ufology” (except for serious true ufologists, who are not lacking in the human arena, but have nothing to do with ordinary “ufology”) is totally unreliable when we want to attempt to make science on certain subjects. For instance, Youtube is totally full of fakes, lies, and inventions on the UFO issue: this confuses people on a side, on another side this manipulates people who do not use critical thinking enough; fake and hoaxes can reveal themselves to be extremely dangerous in this sense. In fact, as a CSI (Committee for Skeptical Inquiry) supporter I am trying to invite people to a more rational approach in the study of this problem. This doesn’t exclude at all that Earth may have been visited: an open mind is absolutely necessary in Science, in general: on the contrary we explore nothing and science becomes sterile. But in this specific field the “noise” is so huge compared to any possible “signal” that the only way to extract, in case, the signal is necessarily to use a total skepticism and also zero declarations to the public regarding this specific issue.
L: 18. What do you say about this? Possible plasma life form?
“Plasma Life Forms in Space
An international scientific team has discovered that under the right conditions, particles of inorganic dust can become organized into helical structures which can interact with each other in ways that are usually associated with organic life. Using a computer model of molecular dynamics, V N Tsytovich and his colleagues of the Russian Academy of Science showed that particles in plasma can undergo self-organization as electric charges become separated and the plasma becomes polarized.
Plasma Life Forms in the Laboratory
In 2003 physicists; Erzilia Lozneanu and Mircea Sanduloviciu of Cuza University, Romania, described in their research paper how they created plasma spheres in the laboratory that can grow, replicate and communicate - fulfilling most of the traditional requirements for biological cells. “
Massimo Teodorani: Yes. You caught the big point, here. Since three years, after the publication of this prominent physics paper by German and Russian scientists (Tsytovich et al.):
http://iopscience.iop.org/1367-2630/9/8/263/fulltext
I started to consider quite seriously the possibility that some behavior of Hessdalen-like lights might be explained as “plasma life forms”: and this is another work hypothesis that I have decided to ponder and evaluate in depth. I have identified several concrete elements in the Hessdalen-like phenomenology that might match quite well with this possibility. Concerning this I remind you that yet in my 2004 JSE paper (page 233) I mentioned some observations that I did in which some kind of secondary ball ejections mimic very well the cellular multiplication process. In addition to a divulging science article of mine in Italian, I discussed quite extensively this hypothesis also in the last chapter of my 2008 book “Sfere di Luce” (Macro Edizioni). More or less at the same time, after studying some additional hypotheses based on “quantum entanglement” and on brain studies, together with a colleague of mine I prepared a research project in this specific sense. You can find it here as a poster that we presented 3 years ago at the Naturwissenshaften in Salzburg (Austria) during the Quantum Mind 2007 Congress:
http://www.scienzaemistero.com/2007/imm/QM-MTGN2.jpg
( Teodorani M. & Nobili G. (2007). “Anomalous Light Phenomena vs. Brain Electric Activity”. Abstract at: http://www.sbg.ac.at/brain2007/abstracts/posters.htm )
Of course we do know quite well (even if published almost nothing technical yet in long papers on this specific issue) that very many witness exist in the world who report a kind of “interaction” with this kind of phenomena. This happened also to some scientists (not me and my colleagues, anyway). In the light of what has been published in recent papers concerning the “plasma life hypothesis”, and also supporting ourselves with some recent findings in some applications of quantum theory in mesoscopic situations (such as microtubules in the brain) and the electrically cooperative nature of plamas, we decided to prepare some feasibility study all aimed at a specific goal that may be synthesized in this question: is it possible to demonstrate scientifically that some plasmas are “life forms” and that they are occasionally able to interact with us? We think that this is demonstrable and/or disprovable scientifically if only the experiment we proposed will ever be attempted with the necessary completeness and rigor (we did only a little part of it so far, in particular studying the EEG “theta state” of a witness who was with us somewhere in the Apennines just in concomitance with some sightings we all had). Of course this hypothesis can be also disproved by the fact that it might be the light phenomenon itself (without being “intelligent” at all) to induce hallucinations due to the electromagnetic field that it produces (such as in Persinger’s theory in neurophysiology) in people. We hope to conduct this experiment soon: not easy to carry out, but possible. You’ll see details of this research project in our Austrian 2007 poster.
Of course if really a “plasma life form” exists, after looking how it imitates the DNA replication and evolution, we cannot exclude that such kind of “life” may evolve into a form of “intelligence” here and everywhere in the Universe. This possibility needs to be studied using both experimental rigor and quantitative approach and a healthy open mind, such as Science should require always. If this hypothesis were proved, then we would have a dramatic revolution both in physics and in what we think we know of two processes named Life and Intelligence.
L: I really hope that you will find some time to answer these questions. Take your time. Thanks in advance.
Massimo Teodorani: Thank you for your questions and for your interest.
___________________________________________
Dr. Massimo Teodorani, Ph.D.
Astrophysicist - University Physics Lecturer
As this week I will atttend the EGU (European Geosciences Union annual conference) in Vienna and meet the Hessdalen Norwegian researchers, I thought that it was the perfect time to post this interview of Erling Strand. (all articles’ photos are courtesy of Project Hessdalen, Erling Strand and Bjorn Gitle Hauge)
The Hessdalen Phenomena (HP) are transient luminous phenomena which is observed in the low atmosphere over the Hessdalen valley in Norway. The phenomenon, still unexplained, appears like a glowing light ball with dimensions ranging from decimeters up to 30 meters. Since the mid of 1980’s, camera observations and data measurements have given qualitative and quantitative observations which complement the observations reported by Hessdalen valley inhabitants. Ass. Professor Erling Strand works at the Østfold University College (Norway) as a teacher in the Department of Information Technology. He has a master degree in electrical engineer from the University of Trondheim and studied physical electronics and telecommunications. He is one of the founders of what is called “Project Hessdalen” (HP) (Website:http://www.hessdalen.org/), a project that has been dedicated to studying this unexplained phenomena. In addition, Erling is also the European representative of the Society for Scientific Exploration.
Having had the pleasure to meet him recently (and I will see him this week at the 2012 European Geosciences Union General Assembly in Vienna, I took the opportunity to ask him the latest HP news:
1/ Some scientists remain skeptical about the existence and significance of the HP phenomena. What do you reply to them?
There are very few of such scientists left. There have been so much documentation of the phenomena during the years, so I tell them to be
more updated.
2/ You participated for the first time last April to an European Geosciences Union General Assembly. Could you tell if this
proved to be beneficial and what kind of feedback you received?
I haven’t seen any directly beneficial so far, but in general it is important to inform people at the Geosciences Union about the phenomena.
Journalists do contact me often. I don’t ask the journalists where they got the info from. Lately it could have been due to my participation on the EGU, – but that is just speculations.
3/ 27 years after the first field investigation in Hessdalen (http://www.hessdalen.org/reports/hpreport84.shtml), what has been
learnt on the Hessdalen Phenomena?
It is difficult to say this in a short term. We know that there are many different types of the phenomena, and they are capture on radar. – An answer on your question could be part in a book.
4/ Do you have any information on the possible frequency of apparition of the UP phenomena; i.e. what were the declared sightings records of the last five years? And is the Hessdalen Valley the only location in Norway where this kind of phenomena is reported?
The data of observations the last 5 year is no good. The only good data source is the amount of observations done during the Science Camp’s, which takes place during one week, each year. There have been observations on all these Science Camp.
5/ Beside the three main types of HP (i.e. white or blue flashed; big yellow lights, several lights together); could you tell us more about the others kinds of sightings that are reported?
Could provide a recent testimony for illustrating this? These three different types consists each of many different types of lights. For
instance “big yellow light”, can have many different shapes, lifetime, moving behavior etc. There are also some types which does not fit into any of these “big” boxes. There are daylight observations, which are not a light. But there are very few of such sightings. It can be different solutions to all of these types of phenomena.
6/ Last year collaboration was initiated with the GEIPAN and some French research institutes, could you update us on the current status of this partnership and if some results, data have been obtained from the new equipments installed (electric field and infrasound)?
The French institutes have installed instruments in Hessdalen, which continuous record data. They measure electrical and magnetic fields.
Whenever observations are done in Hessdalen, it is possible to find out if there have been any unusual magnetic or electrical recordings. The data from these instruments need to be collected manually. They are not on the internet.
7/ In order to acquire more data on the HP and come up with a final theory and explanation, what do you think would need to be done? What instruments would be needed and what kind of logistic would be ideal?
If founding had been present, we could find a solution. There are no people working full time on this now. I would build logistics on the data, with a main database. There should be better mapping of different physical properties in the Hessdalen valley. There should have been camera recordings in the IR, UV and the visual. A good radar system. Better reporting system. More cameras, so 3D mapping of the phenomena could have been done.
8/ In 2009 Billionaire Robert Bigelow made a significant donation to the American Ufological association MUFON for supporting a rapid response team that would quickly reach the destination of a high-level UFO event. In the case of the Hessdalen Phenomena, how can you persuade some potential investors to provide some funding or others relevant resources?
Why is it important to study the HP? Finding the solution of the HP will give new info about our world. It could be groundbreaking knowledge, because so far the HP does not seems to fit into a known part of our world. Such possible groundbreaking news about our world is important. How important is difficult to say before we know it. Could there be a new energy source? Could this energy source be used so that there will be no need for any fossil fuels? Or maybe even more important info could be achieved.
9/ In a recent interview, you have stated that “…you have had several daytime observations, where you have seen flying discs, etc…”Even if not related to the HP, could you please provide more details on such sightings?
I have had only three daytime observations, so the word “several” is wrong. I have however seen several unexplainable “things”, – such which goes into another category than HP or ufo. Two of those three observations was a flying disc. The third was a “black hole”. I did not get the impression that I was looking onto a black object, it was more like a hole into something completely black. This “black hole” changed size all the time.
Thanks Erling for this interview and you success with your Project Hessdalen
Columnist: Unexplained Mysteries
UM forum regular "The L" recently secured an interview with teacher and researcher Erling Strand who heads a long-running project aimed at investigating the mysterious Hessdalen Valley lights in Norway.
1.Is it proven that 95% of Hessdalen phenomena is plasma? Or are we still talking about UFOs? I read that conclusion of the research was that "...its behavior most often unpredictable." And unknown origin.
No, it is not proven that the Hessdalen Phenomena is a plasma, but in many cases it might be a possibility. The many differences of shapes, colors, lifetime, behavior etc. makes us believe there may be different types of phenomena we are studying. There may be several answers to the question: What is it?
You may call it UFO, if you use J.Allen Hynek’s definition. But if you think of spacecrafts, we have very few sightings which indicate such.
2. Is it possible that there will be one more documentary about the Hessdalen phenomena?
There have been a lot of TV programs already: http://www.hessdalen.org/press/tv/index.shtml Impossible to know if there will be more. There are also some documentary’s which are not on the list, because they have not been sent on TV, as far as I know.
3. Are there proof that we don’t talk about plasma?
Some of the sightings are difficult to explain as plasma, but many others are easier to explain as plasma. Remember plasma is a state. Other states are frozen (hard), liquid, gas, and then plasma. Which state “something” has, is depending on the temperature. A plasma state is mostly when there is a high temperature. The few times we have had the possibility to get the temperature, there are no indication of high temperature. None have ever indicated heat, even when they have been relative close to the phenomena. We don’t have any burn marks when it has touched the ground. However, we don’t know the temperature of the sightings up in the air,
There are probably several solutions to what the Hessdalen Phenomena are. Look at my answer to your question no.1
4. What about that 5% Hessdalen unsolved case? Is in that percentage just “solid objects” or also plasma with sharp geometric shapes? Do you think that are another phenomena? How can plasma have sharp geometric shape?
100% of the sightings of the Hessdalen Phenomena (HP) are unsolved. It is unsolved even if you find out something about it. It is not solved, even if it should be found to be plasma, or anything else. If it is plasma, the big question is: How can that plasma occur, and live in Hessdalen, Where does the energy come from, etc. When we found possible Scandium in a couple of cases, it is not solved. If you say it is solved when you find Scandium (or any other element) in it, you could say you have found out the solution of a car, when you find there is iron in the car. It is a long way from the element iron, to the car. I hope you understand what I am trying to tell.
5. Ejecting mini balls to even 100 meters. Is plasma able to that? What is reason for that behavior? Also that balls in some cases join together in triangular shape. If plasma why is doing this? Is there any case before Hessdalen that plasma join in triangular shape?
Remember: We have not made any conclusion on what the phenomena are.
6. How is it possible that we capture phenomena on the radar yet it was invisible to our eyes? The light phenomenon often shows strong radar tracks, including when it is optically faint or almost invisible. In some cases in which it is visible, it shows no radar track. Is plasma able to do that? It seems to me that the phenomena have some switch "off" and "on”.
When something is recorded on radar, it tells that it reflect electromagnetic waves. Strong reflections indicate a strong gradient of some kind. It doesn’t need to be a solid object to be captured on radar. Only a strong gradient is needed. For instance a local high ionization, or a high energy Rydberg state.
7.What about that Doppler VLF noise? I heard that others type of plasma can make that sound. Like sprites.
The “possible” Doppler VLF signals are still a mystery. What can move in such a high speed?
8. Can you tell us more about Doppler VLF signals? Any theories ?
It just looked as something transmitting a VLF signals was moving very fast. No theories.
9. After researchers done laser test they felt like in boat. Did you ever measured low-frequency EM-field?
The feeling of “standing in a waving boat” did not occur in connection with the laser test. When such waving feeling came, we had no instruments running, which measured low-frequency EM signals. Such waving feeling, which indicate some influence of the inner ear, can occur when there are strong low-frequency EM signals, or low-frequency sound waves (infra sound)
10. Are there any theories about feeling of “standing in a waving boat”? What can produce low f. EM signals or Infra sound?
No good theories exists.
11. How far did SETV project go in Hessdalen? Is there any new momentum in that direction (possible exogenous probes)?
“Possible exogenous probes”: No, such are speculations, which may be based on some sightings. It is ok to have speculations, but you must never forget it is speculations, which may be wrong. I don’t claim it is wrong, but we don’t have any proves on the existence of such probes.
If the speculations are put forward as facts, the real scientific data can be drowned in the speculations, and people may put everything in the “only speculation” box. That may destroy the facts and the whole field.
12. Are there any signs of intelligence in the Hessdalen phenomena?
The topic of possible intelligence behavior is a difficult topic. One difficulty is how should you define an intelligence behavior? First of all; we have very few happenings which could indicate possible intelligence behavior. Please note the word “possible”. One such happening is the laser test, during the first field work in 1984. We directed a laser to a flashing light. Whenever we did that, the flashing frequency doubled. The power of the laser was too week to claim there was the power from the laser, which influenced on a possible unstable situation. The total power from the He-Ne laser was only 1 mW.
About one week after that, a red spot of light moved around our feet. This light on the snow looked like as if our laser was pointing to the snow. The strong spot of red light moved for some seconds around our feet.
Our second happening could more easily be explained as a more possible natural happening. It was a light standing in the hillside. After one and a half hour it started to move out from the hillside, and stopped in the middle of the valley. It then started to move towards the observers. When they pushed the transmit button on the walkie-talkie, it disappeared.
Other possible intelligence behaviors are on a different label, and cannot be talked about. All together, the amount of possible intelligence behavior are so small, so it does not deserve any further attention.
13. Whats your opinion on cigar shape object sightings?
I have talked to the observers myself. They tell about what the saw. It tells about the big variety of sightings. Probably several different phenomena we are seen.
14. Is there “another dimension hypothesis” or “ET hypothesis” about Hessdalen phenomenan?
There are many different hypothesis, set out by different people. I myself will not put forward any hypothesis before more facts are gathered.
15. What is your opinion. Is it true that Norway army testing new airplanes in Hessdalen valley?
No. There has only been observed ordinary military planes. Some planes have however flown very low in the valley.
16. Is there any other weird, odd things happening in Hessdalen valley besides HP?
Well, all places in the countryside have stories of weird odd things. Not any more in Hessdalen than other places I believe. I should say that I have not studied this, so I cannot say for sure. My saying is only based on talking with the inhabitants
17. What is your plan for the future?
Continue searching for the answers, so we can get to know our universe better.
18. Can you tell us something new about phenomena? Any news? Or can you tell us something interesting. Some new sightings. New theory.
The French GEIPAN are also doing measurements in Hessdalen. Ref: http://tinyurl.com/6zz4qdj
I hope this cooperation will lead to some important data about the phenomena.
I feel many people have a tendency do make conclusions on too weak data, and also want to put things in a “known box”. For instance: In the early days in Hessdalen, when everybody used the name ufo. I got stories where the witnesses described a light with windows. The “known box” was that people had heard that ufo is a spacecraft, with windows. I wondered how it was possible to see windows on a light, and asked them more about that. It came out that they hadn’t seen any windows on the light, but they have heard that ufo had windows. That is one of the reasons for why we started to call it the Hessdalen Phenomena (HP). People had no pictures in their mind on how the HP looked like. The descriptions become more correct after that. – Even if I have had several daytime observations, where I have seen flying disc etc., I cannot say where these come from. Many say they must come from exo planets. How do they know? Why not another time, another dimension or maybe even more far-fetched. Even if I have had daytime observations, and know such exists, I do not connect that to the HP. It may be completely different things.
It is fun to do speculations, - but it is important to not mix that with real facts.
A speculation: Could it be new natural phenomena? It is a speculation because we do not have any hard facts which underline that.
I would very much like to see people, who are interested in such phenomena, use more of their time in getting data. When we started Project Hessdalen, back in 1983, we had no money and we had to use our holidays. But the most important: We wanted to get data. A strong will, which can drive the train.
If you are pointing your finger to someone and ask: “why don’t they do anything”, remember three fingers are pointing back to yourself.
I do like people are discussing the phenomena. Keep up the work.
The Conclusions of the EMBLA missions
As already mentioned, PhD. astrophysicist Massimo Teodorani related to the Italian branch of Project Hessdalen, was the leader/coordinator at the three field studies conducted in Hessdalen in 2000, 2001 and 2002 (project EMBLA). In this regard, it is published a number of reports and huge amounts of research data.
The results and conclusions are startling, and can be summarized in the following table:
As the table demonstrates, 85% of the observed phenomena shows (external) plasma characteristics (including 5% geometric shapes). The remaining 5% of the observed phenomena shows characteristics of solid, structured objects (and 10 % of uncertain character).
Teodorani explains the results in this article: «The Physical study of atmospheric luminous anomalies and the SETVhypothesis»:
A fundamental result which was ascertained directly on the field during two intensive scientific missions, is just that the Hessdalen phenomenology is characterized by two well- distinguished aspects:
the very most part of luminous apparently immaterial orbs for which an external plasma appearance has been ascertained, but with highly anomalous characteristics both thermodynamically and morphologically,
a slender but significant minority of objects which possess sharp characteristics of solidity.
This double way in which the learnt phenomenology appears can be interpreted only in two alternative ways: or like an overlap of two phenomena with sharply different characteristics, OR like two sharply different behaviours of the same phenomenon.
Anyway it must be reminded that, by assuming that the second option is taken into account, well-known laws of radiation physics say very clearly that the instrumental verification of the plasma nature of a given phenomenon, is not sufficient to demonstrate that the phenomenon is a plasma entirely, but only that his external surface (or: photosphere) behaves like a plasma which, by its nature, is able to hide all what exists inside it, as any photon coming from the interior should be immediately absorbed or scattered by the cloud of ions and electrons which are located in the external region, which in its turn is the only one which can be monitored instrumentally. In order to try to penetrate inside the plasma cloud, during the next missions, an “imaging radar” is planned for use, together with a high-resolution spectrograph [1] able to furnish a much more precise quantitative description of the plasma photosphere of the phenomenon
Conclusive Notes
Since the first field-observation in Hessdalen (EMBLA 2000) it has been possible to learn that, together with a big majority of lights of the “plasmoid type”, structured objects were present too: at first a triangle of lights, then a low-luminosity egg-like translucid object [21]. During the second field-observation (EMBLA 2001) something similar to a flattened ellipsoid was recorded [23]. All these specific evidences of “structured targets” do not demonstrate at all, of course, that Hessdalen is subject to ET visitation.
On the contrary it is even more reasonable to suspect that the governments which are at present possibly experimenting flying devices working with “exotic tecnology”, would choose locations just like Hessdalen in order to work with no disturb by putting into practice the best of the camouflages. The co-existence of anomalous lights of possible natural origin linked to the territory and of flying machines born from some mind of the “Skunk Works” might permit to some government to operate in total secret by letting the public opinion believe that Hessdalen is an alien basis.
Therefore, the fact that some “structured events” in Hessdalen were recorded by EMBLA, is not a proof that Earth is visited by exogenous probes. Nevertheless this possibility in itself, as a pure work-hypothesis, is not at all excluded by official science, and it is included inside the plans (introduced before) of the SETV project. As it has been said, Earth may be reached in several ways which are canonically accepted. In order that this possibility may be proved or confuted, it is necessary to expand of at least an order of magnitude, both the sophistication and the completenesse of the sensing instrumentation.
[21] Teodorani M., Montebugnoli S. & Monari J. (2000) ‘The EMBLA 2000 Mission in Hessdalen’, NIDS, Articles,
http://www.nidsci.org/articles/articles1.html#teodorani
[23] Teodorani M., Strand E.P. & Hauge B.G. (2001), ‘EMBLA 2001: The Optical Mission’, ICPH, Articles, http://www.itacomm.net/PH
Here it is worth noting that Teodorani keeps the door open for the SETV hypothesis (extraterrestrial visitation), but suggests that secret experiments with exotic technology are a more likely explanation.
A mechanism to explain the spectrum of Hessdalen Lights phenomenon
G. S. Paiva • C. A. Taft - Received: 26 August 2011 / Accepted: 11 May 2012 / Published online: 26 May 2012 - Springer-Verlag 2012
Abstract In this work
We present a model to explain the apparently contradictory spectrum observed in Hessdalen Lights (HL) phenomenon. According to our model, its nearly flat spectrum on the top with steep sides is due to the effect of optical thickness on the bremsstrahlung spectrum. At low frequencies self-absorption modifies the spectrum to follow the Rayleigh–Jeans part of the black body curve.This spectrum is typical of dense ionized gas. Additionally, spectrum produced in the thermal bremsstrahlung processes flat up to a cutoff frequency, mcut, and falls off exponentially at higher frequencies. This sequence of events forms the typical spectrum of HL phenomenon when the atmosphere is clear, with no fog.
We conclude that HL is probably a cold plasma. This fact explains the absence of combustion or fire when the phenomenon occurs amongst the trees, in the forest. Of course,the absence of combustion, deemed to be a successful prediction of the authors’ model, could also be an expected consequence of much more mundane explanations [for example, vehicle headlights (Leone 2006)]. However, we believe that the Teodorani spectrum (Fig. 1b) is correct (real) and it does not result from intrinsic factors of the instrumentation in itself (bad choice of film, long exposure times) as suggested by Leone (2006). We can see that the spectrum of Fig. 2 (bremsstrahlung spectrum) is similar to the pure (real) spectrum observed in HL phenomenon (Fig. 1b) when the atmosphere is clear, with no fog. Thus,probably the HL spectrum is caused by high energy electrons in the thick atmospheric plasmas accelerated upward by electric field from rocks under the ground (Paiva and Taft 2012), forming a thermal bremsstrahlung spectrum with flat top and steep sides of an optically thick plasma in ID image. This characteristic simulates the spectrum of an illuminated solid body. The authors make clear that the reason for their belief in the genuineness of the Teodorani spectrum is its similarity with a bremmstralung spectrum. However, a comparison with other conventional spectra was not carried out.
Source : link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1007/s00703-012-0197-5