Creation Moment 8/22/2021 - Light Echo: V838 Monocerotis

"The star mentioned on page 242 of, Dismantling the Big Bang is

known as V838 Monocerotis (named because it was the 838^th variable star of the faint constellation Monoceros (Unicorn)). The Hubble space telescope first spotted it in 2002. Because there are still questions of how and why it erupted, V838 Monocerotis is thought to be a binary star system, i.e., two stars orbiting close together. It is in the constellation of Monoceros, 19,000 light years away.

 

If the speed of light has changed in the past, the change would most likely occur at a time when miracles are freely allowed. 

---For Evolutionists this is the Planck era, i.e. the first 5.39 × 10^-44 s of the universe, where current theories of physics are not able to make retrodictions. 

---For the creationist, this is Creation Week.

Although creationists can account for a change in the speed of light (we have a miracle worker), most creationist astronomers suggest alternative theories as a solution to the light travel time problem.

But in the case of V838 Monocerotis, the speed limit of the universe appears to be broken!

It is important to note that the object expanding is not the star itself

(or the remnants of the 2002 eruption) but a surrounding shell of nearby interstellar dust (presumably from an earlier eruption).

The shell only appears to expand at a superluminal velocity because the light the dust gives off is a ‘light echo:’ The light originates from the star’s 2002 eruption and is re-radiated by the dust shell. 

Similar geometric effects produce apparent superluminal motion in radio galaxies, BL Lac objects (active galactic nuclei that emit signals that vary on all time scales and at all frequencies!), quasars and blasars.

Galaxies do appear to be moving away from us and the Bible describes a stretching of the heavens: covering yourself with light as with a garment, stretching out the heavens like a tent. Psalm 104:2, he that created the heavens, and stretched them out Isaiah 42:5; that stretcheth forth the heavens alone;44:24; have stretched out the heavens 45:12; and my right hand hath spanned the heavens: 48:13; that hath stretched forth the heavens 51:13 that I may plant the heavens 51:16; hath stretched out the heavens by his discretion Jeremiah 10:12; hath stretched out the heaven by his understanding 51:15; which stretcheth forth the heavens Zechariah 12:1.

A light echo: Light ray A, direct from the source (yellow star) arrives at the observer (blue dot) first. Light ray B and C reflect off the gas cloud, but because B has a shorter path it arrives at the observer first. To the observer, B and C appear to come from the same point in the sky. It therefore appears that the illumination of the gas cloud in the direction perpendicular to A is faster than the speed of light.

The universe appears to be expanding in all directions, in a similarway, stars explode in all directions." CMI