In what sounds like something out of a bad Sci-Fi straight to streaming movie, the US media appears to be suggesting Cuba has a covert mind damaging “Sonic weapon” or ray gun for us sci-Fi nerds, which apparently affected the brains of 44 former diplomats and their family members.
Ray Gun – probably nothing like the one Cuba may or may not have. Image:larryrains/Shutterstock
What We Know
Late in 2016, staff stationed at the US embassy in Havana began complaining about a range of symptoms including dizziness, loss of balance, hearing loss, anxiety and a more generalised “cognitive fog”. A number of their family and relatives stationed there also reported the symptoms. So because of this (and not because President Obama opened it), the Trump administration decided to effectively close the US Embassy and the US state department issued travel warnings in response to the incidents.
Canada also cut its Embassy staff earlier this year after a number suffered similar symptoms, however, they have discounted the “Ray Gun” theory and have no travel concerns for its citizens, around one million of whom visit the country each year.
The Theory
Fast forward to 2019 and US Cuba relations are frozen again like they were pre the Obama administration and the Journal of the American Medical Association publishes a paper from the University of Pennsylvania, confirming that something happened but they don’t know what.
The study which appears to have been quite rigorous involved 44 of those who had reported symptoms going to the University of Pennsylvania’s brain trauma centre for MRI scans which did show significant differences in whole of the brain of those affected as compared to a control group and Professor Verma who was involved in the research has said “Whatever happened was not due to a pre-existing condition, because we test for that,” & “It’s not imagined, all I can say is that there is truth to be found.” However, in his paper, the conclusions state “The clinical importance of these differences is uncertain and may require further study”.
This is not the first study made and some investigation went into sound recordings made by US Staff in Cuba, which may have been linked to the sonic ray, however, nothing conclusive arose and a biorxiv published paper has indicated that the mysterious sounds most likely emanated from the Indies Short-Tailed Cricket (Anurogryllus celerinictus), who’s calls are in the 7 kHz, range and is delivered at an unusually high rate. This can give humans the sensation of a continuous sharp trill.
US/UK scientists: Recording of “sonic attacks” on US diplomats in #Cuba spectrally matches the echoing call of a Caribbean crickethttps://t.co/LqDAmVKA10 pic.twitter.com/4IgxhjUZhP
— José Ramón Cabañas (@JoseRCabanas) January 4, 2019
There doesn’t appear to have been any reports from other Embassies although a similar thing apparently happened in the US Embassy in China in 2018.
However, the Short-Tailed Cricket is not found in Asia which rules out their involvement in that incident.
Image Credit:pong-photo9/shutterstock
Pity as it would have made a great story – the revenge of the Crickets, which are one of the worlds more consumed insects.
