CNN recently covered the detection by the Telescope Array of the second-highest energy particle ever observed. The cable news channel spoke with study coauthor and University of Utah research professor John Matthews about the extreme rarity of the event.
“If you hold out your hand, one (cosmic ray) goes through the palm of your hand every second, but those are really low-energy things [...] When you get out to these really high-energy (cosmic rays), it’s more like one per square kilometer per century. It’s never going through your hand.”
The author of the article also reached out to NASA scientists to get some perspective on how much energy this newly discovered particle contained relative to the particles that cause the aurora borealis. Suffice it to say, the CNN article contains a lot of zeros.
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