NASA Mars Rover Captures Mysterious Glow On Red Planet

UFO hunters and conspiracy theorists had a ball day when a recent photo released by NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory blog showed a mysterious glow along the horizon of Planet Mars.

The photo, taken via Navcam that was placed onboard NASA’s Mars rover Curiosity, showed a shining white orb that’s seemingly floating above the Martian surface. The image was spotted by a number of UFO believers who constantly check on available photos from the space agency in search of any sign of extraterrestrial life form.

The discovery was discussed in the notorious UFO forum, Above Top Secret, described as “the internet's beehive for all things conspiracy, UFO, paranormal and just about anything crank-related.” According to some discussions, the glowing orb is likened to the unexplained “Tic Tac” flying objects often reported by U.S. Navy pilots.

According to this report, the theories shared on the forum are quite wild, with some associating it as a religious phenomenon or as a message from up above. “It’s God performing a sign or wonder to show that he is the Lord of the entire universe. He can make lights and signs in the sky and tell prophets what’s about to happen before it happens so they can tell everyone else that it’s going to happen, then it does,” forum participants said.

Some of the followers of the page, however, debunked the theory by saying it could have been a simple lens flare. One theorist pointed out that since Curiosity often snaps photos simultaneously every other minute, the mysterious orb should have been visible in other photos, as well.

“There is nothing in the image frames before or anything showing up in the images after this image. Chances are it is just a cosmic ray hitting the image sensor. It is worth pointing out though because it does not seem to be your average cosmic ray hit to me. I admit a cosmic ray hit can look different, but a lot of the time they look like streaks and not like this,” one forum participant said.

The photo with the mysterious glow has now been shared from the JPL blog more than 100,000 times.