The fireball that exploded over Papua New Guinea in 2014 was no ordinary space object. The mysterious object turned out to be a meteor that came from another star system, aka interstellar.
The meteorite that exploded in northeastern Papua New Guinea on January 18, 2014 was known as CNEOS 2014-01-18 . Its size is very small, only 45 cm, but when it enters Earth its speed reaches 210,000 km/h - far exceeding the average speed of meteors orbiting the solar system.
This finding was reported in a study by two researchers from Harvard University, Amir Siraj and Avi Loeb, published in Arxiv in 2019. The study argued that the meteor's velocity and orbital trajectory was 99% proof that the object came from outside the solar system.
Although almost completely certain, the research never went through a peer review process or was published in a scientific journal because some of the data needed to verify their calculations was withheld by the United States government because it was classified as classified data.
Now Siraj and Loeb's findings have been confirmed by researchers from the U.S. Space Command (USSC). In a memo dated March 1 and shared on Twitter on April 6, USSC Lieutenant Commander John E. Shaw wrote that the analysis was accurate enough to confirm the interstellar trajectory.
This means that CNEOS 2014-01-18 is the first interstellar object ever detected in our solar system. The discovery of this object preceded the discovery of Oumuamua, a cigar-shaped object that caused a stir when it was discovered in 2017.
Just like the meteorite, Oumuamua also moves so quickly that it is easily recognized as an interstellar object. The difference is that Oumuamua's presence is detected far from Earth and is already on its way out of the solar system.
Due to their very small size, most of these meteorites have already burned up in the atmosphere. There is a possibility that debris from the object landed in the waters of the Pacific Ocean and immediately sank to the seabed, as quoted from Science Alert, Saturday (16/4/2022).
Although searching for small debris in the vast ocean is extremely difficult, Siraj said he had consulted with experts about the possibility of launching an expedition to find the historic object.
"The possibility of getting the first piece of interstellar material alone is interesting enough to examine this very carefully and discuss with all the world's experts about ocean expeditions to find meteorites," Siraj said.