- A retired Adelaide physicist has been dragged into an
Internet hysteria - about a comet hitting Earth - by an imposter who has
cast him as a doomsayer.
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- The drama has been unfolding around the world for a month,
but has only just come to the attention of an angry Dr Grant Gartrell,
a victim of identity theft and, as a result, the man credited with the
end-of-the-world predictions.
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- "I am very displeased to be caught up in a hoax,"
he said.
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- Dr Gartrell's name has been widely published on the Internet
as the originator of a prediction that comets were heading for Earth.
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- The 60-year-old, who now runs a blueberry farm at Mt
Compass, has written a thesis on comets, but says that's where the connection
ends.
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- Returning on Saturday from a caving conference in Tasmania,
he found his telephone message bank and his e-mail crammed with messages
from overseas including one from a US journalist keen to break the comet
story.
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- The person posing as Dr Gartrell first posted messages
on Internet sites from "Aussie Bloke". He then identified himself
as Dr Gartrell.
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- According to the hoaxer, the world does not have long
to go and, tomorrow, "the first dust cloud reaches earth", with
a "darkening of skies".
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- The first comet impact is supposedly scheduled for June
18-20, with second and third impacts a few days later. "I have no
idea who is posing as me and making predictions of imminent cataclysmic
cometary impacts," Dr Gartrell said.
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- "I am one of the authors of an article on meteors
which appeared in the Australian Journal of Physics in 1975 but, although
still interested in it, I have not actively worked in that field much since
that time."
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- Hundreds of Internet pages have been devoted to claims
that comets are approaching Earth. Some tell people to go to a remote place
with supplies and wait for the end.
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- "There is more chance of winning the lottery than
of a comet striking earth," Dr Gartrell said.
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- "There is always a finite possibility of the impact
of space debris and I am certainly in favour of the work being done on
early-warning systems, but I have no knowledge whatsoever of any ... imminent
threat. I have never met any of the people who are making such claims on
the Internet and, for my own part, I am planning travel arrangements for
conferences I expect to attend in several years time."
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