NASA Confirms Six Days of Darkness Ahead-Fiction!

NASA Confirms Six Days of Darkness Ahead-Fiction!

Summary of eRumor:

Report have gone viral that allege NASA has warned that solar storms will cause six days of complete darkness in December 2014.
 

The Truth:

This eRumor is a scam that was reported by a fake news website.

The fake news website Huzlers.com first reported the false claim that NASA Administrator Charles Bolden had warned that solar storms would sink earth into six days of “almost complete darkness” in December 2014. Although the website’s disclaimer states that it publishes “a combination of real shocking news and satirical entertainment to keep its visitors in a state of disbelief,” the story was shared more than 300,000 times on social media sites.

This isn’t the first time that false claims about future days of darkness have gone viral. In December 2012, reports went viral that NASA had confirmed that a “photon belt” would lead to three days of total darkness.

David Morrison, an astrobiology senior scientist with NASA, didn’t mix words in his response to the eRumor. Morrison said on a NASA discussion board that it was “a really dumb lie.”

“There is no photon belt, and claiming that we will have three days of darkness without indicating how (will the Sun just turn off?) is pretty silly,” Morrison said. “Only one of the dozens of people who have written to me indicated any source for these remarkable claims, and that one source was an obviously tongue-in-cheek website that made no pretense to be reporting the truth.”

Morrison advised readers to search NASA’s website whenever suspicious claims are made about the agency.

Posted 10/27/14