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On 6 April 2016, the New York Post aggregated a news item originally published by the UK tabloid The Sun, which cited top space scientist Daniel Whitmire as holding that a newly discovered planet could destroy Earth any day now: The material as presented was hardly convincing from an astrophysics-centric perspective, as its most compelling portions utilized weasel words such as some believe and some are convinced without elaborating upon whether some were actual scientists or apocalypse cultists. We located some additional information on the topic via a 30 March 2016 press release from the University of Arkansas concerning Planet X and other mass extinctions that have been observed in global fossil records: An initial red flag that appeared in contrasting the Post's outlandish claims and the university press release was the age of some of the discoveries in question. While the current viral article repeatedly references an imminent apocalyptic event due to a newly discovered planet, the university press release describes study that has been ongoing for more than 30 years: More illuminating is the fact that the university press release makes absolutely no mention whatsoever of any imminent catastrophes. That item is notably inconclusive and ends with a question about the planet's potential impact on the fossil record over the course of millions of years: We contacted Whitmire via e-mail to ask about the Post's claim that all life on Earth could be wiped out in April 2016, and he quickly replied: No truth to the story at all. That's quite impossible. We also got in touch with the press department at the American Museum of Natural History's Hayden Planetarium to find out more, but we have not yet received a response. Nonetheless, aside from the alarmist claims of two tabloids, we found no evidence there was any truth to the immediacy of the Planet X rumors.
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