EYOS a pioneer in private superyacht expeditions is co ordinating an offshore expedition led by Harvard University Astrophysicist Avi Loeb that has identified and collected 50 metallic spheres unmatched to any existing alloys in our solar system, indicating a first of its kind finding of interstellar evidence in human history.
Based on board MV Silver Star sailing off the coast of Lorengau, Manus Island, The Interstellar Expedition has used the vessel as its primary operations platform during the search.
These spheres are believed to be remnant fragments of a football sized meteorite that slammed into the Earth’s atmosphere and into the western Pacific Ocean in 2014.
Originating from outside the solar system, it was moving at a speed twice faster than 95% of the stars in the vicinity of the Sun.
It was too small to be noticed by telescopes through its reflection of sunlight, but its collision with Earth generated a bright fireball recorded by US government sensors.
Labelled “Interstellar Meteor 1” and abbreviated as IM1, its discovery has raised questions of its origin, and whether it was made of an artificial alloy that allowed it to survive down to Earth’s lower atmosphere.
The Interstellar Expedition’s mission was to recover the fragments left over from the explosion on the floor of the Pacific Ocean. It did so by extensively towing a sled to survey the seafloor, covering an area of 175 square kilometres.
The team found 50 very small metallic spherules, were retrieved from a depth of about 2 kilometres at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean, where they rested for nearly a decade after arriving there on January 8, 2014.
Initial analysis indicates that their characteristic morphology and composition (mostly iron but negligible nickel, plus trace elements), indicate a common source which is different from background spherules found in control regions.
The fundamental question is whether the meteor was natural or technological in origin, given its anomalously high speed and material strength.
The expedition was funded privately by American entrepreneur Charles Hoskinson.
EYOS has managed several deep water projects including the multi year Five Deeps Expedition, the Ring of Fire Expedition, the RMS Titanic and several extreme depth shipwrecks.