MYSTERY ABOUT DOROTHY EADY AND OMM SETY

Dorothy Eady was a toddler just like any other. She ran, played, and laughed all day, and was a treasure to her doting parents. Then, the unthinkable happened. One morning, Dorothy was running down the stairs at her home near London when she slipped and fell. So severe was the fall that the three-year-old was pronounced dead on the scene.

But then something very unexpected happened: Dorothy woke up. For another four years, her parents had their beautiful daughter back. In 1908, however, everything changed.

On a regular outing to the British Museum, Dorothy’s parents first became aware that the girl was behaving strangely. As soon as they reached the Egyptian section of the museum, Dorothy was transfixed. She couldn’t get enough of the artifacts and sat with a glass-enclosed mummy for a long time, refusing to go home with her parents. Her parents even caught a glimpse of her running around the statues and kissing their feet.

After this incident, things took a turn for the worse. Dorothy became almost depressed and would stare at photos of ancient Egypt insisting that the country was her home and she needed to return to it. A picture of the “Temple of Seti the First at Abydos” got her especially excited one day. She rushed to her father and shouted that this place was her former home.

Before she found the picture of the temple, Dorothy had dreams in which she saw the buildings and greenery of ancient Egypt. Her interest and love for Egypt skyrocketed, and she joined study groups to learn more about reincarnation and spirituality.

She finally moved to Cairo after marrying an Eyptian man and gave birth to a baby that she named Seti. She herself would now be kngown as Omm Sety. Omm’s marriage didn’t last. Her habit of going into a trance and scribbling random hieroglyphics at night about her spirit guide completely freaked her husband out.

Her writings eventually amounted to around 70 pages and detailed Omm’s life in ancient Egypt. It stated that she was a priestess at the Kom El Sultan temple and had a child by Pharoah Seti at the young age of 14. However, she had broken a priestess vow by losing her virginity and took her own life to prevent the Pharaoh from being punished for this crime.

The hieroglyphics also contained accounts of spiritual encounters with Seti and plans to reunite with him in the Egyptian underworld.

This fantastical story has been discarded by many as the ramblings of a crazy person, up until the day that Omm Sety helped archaeologists find the exact location of the Temple Garden. She also led them to an undiscovered tunnel at the north side of the Temple. Omm Sety died in 1981, after having lived the rest of her days at the Temple of Abydos. No rational explanation for her memories, dreams, and knowledge of Egypt has been offered, and many skeptics find themselves wondering if Dorothy Eady was in fact the reincarnation of the ancient Egypt priestess, Omm Sety.

-G.B.RITHIKKA

THE PEKING MAN

Zhoukoudian, situated 50 kilometers to the southwest of Beijing proper, is the former residence of Peking man, who lived here approximately 200,000 to 500,000 years ago. Since the discovery of a complete skull on December 2,1929, Zhoukoudian, which had more recently been noted for its production of lime, became world-famous as the "home of the Chinese ape-man." After the establishment of the People's Republic of China, the number of sightseers and scientists increased rapidly, and Zhoukoudian has become a great tourist attraction. 

Peking Man chose Zhoukoudian as his residence because the limestone caves and crevices in the area provided an excellent habitat. The northern face of Dragon Bone Hill (Longgushan), which stands to the east of the Zhoukoudian Railway Station, is the site of the caves occupied by Peking man; in fact, a total of four early residential sites have been discovered on this hill. Besides those belonging to Peking man, the remains of a site occupied by Hilltop Caveman are the most representative. 

At present, Zhoukoudian' s Dragon Bone Hill has an exhibition hall, which is divided into seven rooms. The first room exhibits fossil remains of Peking man, stone tools, and evidence of Peking man's use of fire. These exhibits also depict Peking man's external appearance and general living conditions. 

The second room demonstrates Hilltop Caveman's fossils, stone tools, bone needles, decorative objects and animal fossils. 

The third room illustrates fossils of man discovered in various parts of China, such as Dingcun Man, Hetao Man, Ziyang Man, Zhalainuoer Man and other fossil copies of the ancient jungle ape, southern ancient ape, Java Man, Neanderthal Man and Cro-Magnon Man that provide an overall understanding of human evolutionary development. 

The fourth room introduces the geological history of Peking man's residence site and displays the process of human and animal evolution through different geological periods. 

The fifth and sixth rooms exhibit vertebrate fossils discovered in other locations around Zhoukoudian, including a display of fish fossils. The seventh room contains the fossils of some of the animals hunted by Peking man. Among them, the tiger and bear were considered Peking man's enemies. The discovery of elephant and rhinoceros fossils at the site demonstrates that the climate during the time of Peking man was far warmer than it is today. 

In addition, one can see the actual caves in which Peking Man and Hilltop Caveman lived. The cave at Site No.1 originally measured 140 meters from east to west. Its width was irregular and it had a height of more than 40 meters. The cave was first occupied approximately 500,000 years ago, and it is estimated that Peking Man maintained this residence over the course of a quarter of a million years.

The bones of Peking Man discovered in the cave in the hill's north face include six complete or relatively complete skulls, eight skull fragments, six pieces of facial bone, 15 mandibles, 153 teeth, seven sections of broken femur, one broken shinbone, three pieces of upper arm bone, one clavicle and one wrist bone belonging to more than 40 individuals of different ages and sexes. Although the materials are fragmentary of human fossil remains from this particular stage of human development. 

In addition, 118 animal fossils have been found in the cave on the north face of the hill. It should be noted that with the exception of five teeth, one upper arm bone and one leg bone, all the original Peking man fossil remains, together with those of Hilltop Caveman, disappeared during World War II and have never been recovered.

-G.B.RITHIKKA.-

THE MYSTERY ABOUT FIREFIGHTER'S FINGERPRINT

For decades, firefighters at the Chicago Fire Department noticed an eerie hand print that left a permanent mark on a casement, which could not be washed, scraped or removed, despite several attempts. Legends circulated, and many believed that the hand print had a rather macabre history, belonging to a fellow firefighter who succumbed to an accident.

ABOUT TO DIE…

On April 18th, 1924, it was an ordinary day for the many firefighters working at the Chicago Fire Department. Apparently, ignorance is bliss. Francis Leavy, firefighter, was cleaning a window at the building. He had been odd all morning. He didn’t talk, didn’t smile or greet his peers, just busied himself with work, with an air of  gloominess around himself. This reminds me of those famous lines:

Like some bold seër in a trance Seeing all his own mischance

Lady of Shallot, by Alfred Tennyson

Suddenly, Leavy foretold in a funereal tone, that he was, in fact, feeling that he was about to die that day. We can imagine a group of fellow workers giggling at this grim pronunciation, with a few purple threads of ill omens these feelings often bring.

REALLY TRAGIC

The phone rang in the most melodramatic manner, a bus conductor announcing that he was noticing flames coming from the Curran’s Hall, a four story building located many blocks away.

Heroic firefighters jumped into the flaming ruins, fighting the wild flames from both sides of the building. But there were people caught up on the upper floors, helpless folk with depleting oxygen. They used ladders to access the upper floors, and so far,the rescue mission was going alright.

 The fire began to show weird properties, it ran down to the lower stories down the stairs, like a liquid flowing down, a common phenomenon in oil fires. The waves of fire soon covered the entire building, the roof crashed first, followed by the walls, causing the death of many, many people who were smashed to the ground under heavy weight, among them, was Francis Leavy.

A MARK OF DEATH

Irremovable Handprint on the Chicago Fire Department Window

Several died, while a lucky few were rescued, with heavy injuries. It was later found out that it was arson, an insurance fraud perpetrated by a novelties business at the ground floor of the building.

Astoundingly, firefighters noticed a strange phenomenon just the day after this tragedy. A strange hand print was left at a window, and not just any window, it was the same one Leavy was cleaning the other day! They tried everything from window cleaners to chemical solvents, but the prints remained. Eventually, they stopped trying in the memory of the martyr.

Sadly, a careless paper boy threw a morning paper upon the closed window on April 18, 1944, destroying the glass and the handprint.

-G.B. RITHIKKA.

MURDER OF JEANNETTE DEPALMA

In 1972, a dog brought something very strange to the back door of his owner’s home. He had sniffed out an almost completely decomposed human forearm on a cliff top in Springfield, New Jersey and dragged it back to its master who realized with a great shock what it was. The man informed the police and, after a short search, they found the remains of the body to which the arm belonged. The remains were that of Jeannette DePalma, a teenager who had been missing for six weeks.

Not only did they find her decomposed body, but there were strange objects on the ground where it lay. Rumors began to fly that the girl had been sacrificed by a local coven of witches. Others believed that Satanists murdered her for occult ritual purposes.

The strangest thing about the murder, however, was the fact that no one wanted to speak about it when an article about the incident was in its planning stages. Even after 30 years, people who lived in the area refused to comment or give their opinions on what they believe happened. Not one person who was interviewed wanted their real name used, and this even included the local police department.

Leads in the case did not come in the traditional manner. People sent in anonymous letters omitting their addresses and names. One of the letters stated that logs had been placed around Jeannette’s body and that the writer of it couldn’t reveal his name for many reasons which he couldn’t reveal either.

Another anonymous writer wrote that he or she knew about a coven of witches in the area who were planning to murder a kid over Halloween. The writer was a child at the time and remembered being terrified of going out trick-or-treating for the holiday. Yet another letter stated that the writer’s mom knew DePalma and that they were about the same age in 1972. This letter also mentioned animals being murdered and strung up in the trees after the murder took place.

In all of the letters, witches or Satanism was mentioned. One of them reiterated that DePalma was a very religious girl who wouldn’t get mixed up with satanic practices. However, the writer also mentions that Jeannette DePalma started becoming a little “wild” as she got older.

The murder of Jeannette DePalma was big news for around two weeks after her body was found, and then the absolute silence around it started and remained. Her murderer has never been found

-G.B. RITHIKKA.

MYSTERIOUS ICELAND VOLCANO

       volcanologists have misplaced a volcanic eruption. They can’t find it – well, they can’t find the volcano that caused it – but they knew it took place in the early 1800s, and they can see its signature in the ice cores of both Greenland and Antarctica. Its ashy material spread across the entire planet, but somehow, no-one witnessed the eruption, and scientists can’t find the source of it.

This may strike you as odd. Enormous volcanic eruptions, particularly on a planet densely populated by humans, rarely go unnoticed. They may not always be documented as factual occurrences, but as legends – and even then, volcanologists use these epics as hints to find the real deal.

In this case, however, there isn’t a single written record of the eruption itself, despite the fact that the environmental fingerprint is indubitable.

Poking around in the two iciest regions of the planet, a team of scientists back in 2009 found a considerably sulphurous layer in the snow layers of 1809 and 1810. Its unique chemical signature indicated that it was generated by a volcanic blast that introduced debris up to 48 kilometers (roughly 30 miles) into the planet’s atmosphere.

When particularly explosive eruptions occur, they tend to release a decent amount of sulphur aerosols. There is no other natural process that releases sulphur compounds to the same degree and in such a short time period – and yet, after a thorough check through the scientific literature, no volcanic eruption had been recorded as happening on either of those years.

Apart from causing a bit of unpleasantly acidic rain, these aerosols also – in large enough quantities – transform into sulphuric acid droplets and clumps which block incoming solar radiation. Some eruptions, like that of Indonesia’s Tambora in 1815, effused such a vast amount of sulphurous particulate matter that Northern Hemisphere the following year was freakishly cold, leading it to be dubbed the “Year Without A Summer.”

 Although Tambora definitely contributed towards this chilling, scientists generally agree that this mysterious eruption was needed as well in order to sufficiently cool the planet

So an eruption definitely, indisputably took place – but where the heck is the original volcano?

In a 2014 paper analyzing the elusive event, researchers report that Colombian scientist Francisco José de Caldas – a polymath that lived around the time of the eruption – might give a hint as to where it could be.

You see, while he was serving as the Director of the Astronomical Observatory of Bogota between 1805 and 1810, he described a strange cloud that blocked the Sun at the end of 1808 and into early 1809. On its own this little tale might have been dismissed as a strange local phenomenon, but he wasn’t alone in his documentation.

Similar observations by Hipólito Unanue – another scientific talent based in Peru – were also made, ones that mentioned that the sunsets had a strange “afterglow” for some time during the winter of 1808. Scientists think that they were describing a sulphurous cloud that, by the process of elimination, had to have come from a tropical volcano – and one that erupted in the last week of November or the first week of December in 1808, not 1809, probably within the South Western Pacific Ocean.

But, to date, that volcano has never been found. Did it completely blow itself apart, or is it so remote that no human whatsoever laid their eyes on it? Was it observed by a local tribe? Everyone that was around back then has long since met their maker, so academics have to rely on science and serendipity alone.

This isn’t the first “missing” volcanic eruption in human history, but as it’s so recent, it’s extremely tantalizing that there is no record of it ever taking place.

So if you do have a hint as to where it might be, do drop us a line. Until then, we’ll have to put up with the ramblings of conspiracy theorists who no doubt blame it on aliens.

-G.B. RITHIKKA.

Ghostly Cosmic Neutrinos Are Stopped Cold by Planet Earth

Ghostly Cosmic Neutrinos Are Stopped Cold by Planet Earth Subatomic particles called neutrinos are notoriously hard to catch because they pass right through regular matter like ghosts. But a new study shows that high-energy neutrinos from cosmic sources aren't totally unstoppable. Researchers from the IceCube experiment in Antarctica announced this week that they have measured the rate at which high-energy neutrinos interact with regular matter instead of passing through unencumbered.

THROUGH THE EARTH:

 Neutrinos don't really affect the everyday lives of most humans: they don't make up atoms (like electrons, protons and neutrons), and they don't play a crucial role in objects their mass. And yet about 100 trillion neutrinos pass through your body every second, according to a statement from the IceCube collaboration. The neutrinos that IceCube is seeking — those from cosmic sources — are almost a million times more energetic than solar neutrinos. These high energy neutrinos may be released by a variety of cosmic events including

supernovas (exploding stars), black hole collisions and gamma ray busts (which may have multiple causes, including colliding neutron stars). "We always say that no particle but the neutrino can go through the Earth," Halzen said in the statement from the University of Wisconsin. "However, the neutrino does have a tiny probability to interact, and this probability increases with energy."

 SET IN ICE:

 The IceCube detector is buried under about 1 mile (1.6 kilometers) of ice, and collects neutrinos coming through the Earth from all directions. Thus, the detector is able to observe how many neutrinos are stopped as they pass through the planet at varying depths. The IceCube scientists "found that there were fewer energetic neutrinos making it all the way through the Earth to the IceCube detector than from less obstructed paths, such as those coming in at near-horizontal trajectories," officials said in the statement from the collaboration. The IceCube Observatory consists of an array of 5,160 basketball-sized detectors, spaced out evenly along 86 "strings" that are dropped down into boreholes in the ice. Collectively, the strings and the detectors take up 0.24 cubic miles (1 cubic km) of ice, located 1 mile (1.6 km) beneath the geographic South Pole. When neutrinos are absorbed by or collide with particles of regular matter, the interaction produces showers of secondary particles. Those particles generate light in the IceCube assembly, which the detector picks up.

Researchers can use the signal to measure the energy of the original neutrino and the direction it came from. The ice blocks particles other than neutrinos that would interact with the detector and create noise in the data. It's possible that with more data, researchers could use IceCube to study the Earth’s interior, perhaps mapping the thickness and of its inner and outer cores, according to the statements. The new paper only relies on data from one year of IceCube observations — between May 2010 and May 2011 — so there is still more for the researchers to analyze. "There are more than seven years of data in the can with the completed detector; therefore, we will deliver a much more precise measurement in the future," Halzen said in the statement from the University of Wisconsin.

By,
Ekshaw.T

easter island mystery solved

IT'S a fascinating sight that has long baffled experts, but new research is finally shedding light on Easter Island's most perplexing mystery. Famously, there are approximately 900 statues, or moai, located around the remote Pacific island, known to locals as Rapa Nui. Most are found around the coast, and were built sometime between the years 1200 and 1600. So why, and how, did they end up there? Researchers from New York's Binghamton University are suggesting that the lost civilization used the iconic statues to signal locations where fresh water was available.

Carl Lipo, an anthropologist who has been looking into how the local Rapa Nui people were able to survive with such limited access to drinking water, led a team who conducted field studies of groundwater around the coast. He wondered how, with no springs or streams and very little rainfall, did the civilization of approximately 15,000-20,000 people survive? According to the research, published in the hydrogeology journal, they were forced to rely on brackish groundwater - which is saltier than fresh water but not as salty as sea water - found in coastal areas, for their source of

drinking water. "Two field surveys indicate abundant locations of brackish but potable water along the coastline," the study states. "Although coastal groundwater sources are of poor quality, they were apparently sufficient to support the population and allow them to build the magnificent statues for which Easter Island is famous." The statues, believed to be of religious and political significance, can stand up to 9m high. "Now that we know more about the location of fresh water, however, the location of these monuments and other features makes tremendous sense: they are positioned where fresh water is immediately available," Dr Lipo said. "Fortunately, water beneath the ground flows downhill and ultimately exits the ground directly at the point at which the porous subterranean rock meets the ocean.

"When tides are low, this results in the flow of freshwater directly into the sea. Humans can thus take advantage of these sources of freshwater by capturing the water at these points." The researchers now aim to further explore the link between the location of the moai and the accessibility to drinking water, which remains a key piece of the puzzle when figuring out what happened to the lost civilization, and how they build the statues. It's believed the Rapa Nui people met their demise upon the arrival of European explorers, with many succumbing to disease. Early accounts of the island described the people appearing to "drink seawater". It's believed this may be referring to groundwater discharge.
By,
Ekshaw.T