To find life on Mars, all US radios were turned off

Currently, planetary scientists are trying to understand Mars. But this interest is not recent, in 1924, the United States turned off all its radios in order to detect intelligent aliens on the Red Planet.

For those in a hurry:

• Earth and Mars come closest every 26 months;
• At one of these moments, the researchers decided to look for signs of intelligent life;
• Beliefs arose as buildings were believed to exist on the Red Planet;
• Because of this, astronomers decided to look for radio signals from the supposed Martian planets;
• The result was quite obvious: nothing was found.

Approach of Earth and Mars

Every 26 months, Mars and Earth make relatively close approaches to each other, for example, in 2003, the two planets were just 55.7 million kilometers apart, the closest they have been in the past 60,000 years. In 1924 they were almost that close.

According to IFL ScienceDuring this time, the government and researchers seized the opportunity to search for intelligent life on Mars. This was not done through telescopes there, but rather by looking for radio signals that alien civilizations might be sending from the Red Planet.

While this idea may seem strange today, at the time, Mars was believed to have signs of alien constructions.

Intelligent life on the Red Planet

For a long time, astronomers believed that in the past, Mars was covered by oceans. The idea of ​​alien civilizations began when Giovanni Schiaparelli made maps showing the existence of canals crossing the planet, and in 1894 Percival Lowell suggested that these canals were built by intelligent extraterrestrials.

It is a direct result that this planet is now home to intelligent creative life. The theory of such life on Mars was by no means my a priori hypothesis, but was derived from observation, and my subsequent observations have fully confirmed it. No other assumption fits all the facts here.

Percival Lowell, Answer The New York TimesIn 1907

Although many astronomers at the time disagreed with this idea, there were those who believed that Lowell's notes were genuine and that he could communicate with these powerful alien civilizations on Mars by radio. So, in 1924, mankind made the first search for extraterrestrial radio signals.

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National Radio Silence Day

The day the signals were searched for became known as “National Radio Silence Day,” and as Earth and Mars approached each other, the U.S. government asked the public to silence their radios for the first five minutes of every hour.

During this time, astronomers kept an eye on the radios, waiting for a possible signal from Mars.

No signal was detected because, as we currently know, there is no intelligent life on Mars. Also, it is unlikely that Martians would choose to communicate by radio, as other signals would be overwhelming.

Although unsuccessful, it was one of the first attempts to find intelligent extraterrestrial life. Some of these searches continue today, and who knows, maybe some other alien civilizations will be found in the future – if they exist.