[continued from previous message]   
      
   researchers believe they have instead stumbled upon...the afterlife?   
   Kent Peterson KC0DGY tells us what did - and didn't -- really happen in   
   this week's final story.   
      
   KENT: Rest in peace, NASA Relay 2 satellite. The spacecraft was one of   
   two launched at different times in the 1960s by the US space agency to   
   serve as experimental communication satellites. Unlike NASA's Relay 1,   
   which transmitted American TV signals into Japan and Europe, Relay 2   
   was used for barely a year. It stopped operations in 1965 and its   
   transponders were believed to have died in 1967   
      
   The key word here is "believed" - because one year ago this month,   
   researchers in Australia were certain they'd heard Relay 2 returning   
   radio pulses to earth in much the same way some so-called "zombie"   
   satellites, like the famous AMSAT OSCAR-7, have been known to do.   
      
   In this case, no seances or Ouija boards were necessary to understand   
   this message from The Great Beyond. Some scientists theorize that the   
   pulses came from the discharge of electrostatic energy, or ESD, that   
   had built up on Relay 2 over time. Another theory is that its impact   
   with a micrometeoroid released a cloud of plasma capable of sending   
   such a signal.   
      
   Researchers plan to study both ESD and the micrometeoroid effect in the   
   hope of a better understanding in the future. It's not about alien life   
   or afterlife, then: Just breathing new life into solving more mysteries   
   of space.   
      
   This is Kent Peterson KC0DGY.   
      
   (NEW SCIENTIST)   
      
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