Mankind first transmitted a dedicated radio message to the stars at 5pm on 16th November 1974 from a radio telescope situated in Arecibo in Puerto Rico, although other radio and television transmissions had been drifting into space for decades; the inadvertent result of normal terrestrial broadcasting. The message sent was a three-minute signal targeted towards a group of stars 24,000 light years away.
Twenty-two years after that first message from humanity was transmitted to the stars, the SETI project (Search for Extra Terrestrial Intelligence) reported that they had detected radio signals in the region of Virginis 70, a star in the constellation of Virgo.
Scientists at the University of California in Berkeley detected the original signals and in order to investigate them further, they attached instruments to their radio telescopes.
They found what they described as a “highly unusual set of signals with a repetitive pattern.” . Following this period of scientific analysis the scientists were able to conclude that the signals detected were similar to UHF television transmissions.
Radio signals have been detected before in space, but what made this discovery particularly exciting was that astronomers had recently noted that the star has a planet similar to our own, and at a similar distance from our own star.
Designated 70 Vir B, this planet is believed to be over six times the mass of Jupiter and orbits around its Sun in an eccentric orbit every 116 days.
Then in June 1988 it was revealed that some of the world�s leading astronomers had collected more than 100 unexplained radio signals during the routine surveillance of space. A report in the British Sunday Times of 7th June 1998 stated, “these faint, pure tones have no natural origin and could have been created artificially, the scientists said. They do not rule out the astonishing possibility that this strange radio traffic could have extra-terrestrial origin.”
However many on this planet were convinced that extra-terrestrials were already visiting us, and that view was shared by the CIA, the US Airforce and even the American President.
UPDATE- On May 23rd, 2011 Unexplainable.Net received an email from a Gmail account claiming to be David Ritchey. It goes on to say:
“He writes about signals coming from a planet, 70 Vir B. However, here is the correct, real story http://www.setileague.org/
editor/70vir.htm