NASA senior scientist David Morrison debunked an apocalyptic claim that a planet called Nibiru is on a collision course with Earth. (NASA) 
 
 A few years ago, NASA senior space scientist David Morrison debunked an apocalyptic claim as a hoax. 
 
 No, there’s no such thing as a planet called Nibiru, he said. No, it’s not a brown dwarf surrounded by planets, as iterations of the claim suggest. No, it’s not on a collision course toward Earth. And yes, people should “get over it.” 
 
 But the claim has been getting renewed attention recently. Added to it is the precise date of the astronomical event leading to Earth’s destruction. And that, according to David Meade, is in six days — Sept. 23, 2017. Unsealed, an evangelical Christian publication, foretells the Rapture in a viral, four-minute YouTube video, complete with special effects and ominous doomsday soundtrack. It’s called “September 23, 2017: You Need to See This.” 
 
 Why Sept. 23, 2017? 
 
 [The ‘Christian numerologist’ whose biblical doomsday claim has some nervously eyeing Sept. 23] 
 
 Meade’s prediction is based largely on verses and numerical codes in the Bible. He has homed in one number: 33. 
 
 “Jesus lived for 33 years. The name Elohim, which is the name of God to the Jews, was mentioned 33 times [in the Bible],” Meade told The Washington Post. “It’s a very biblically significant, numerologically significant number. I’m talking astronomy. I’m talking the Bible … and merging the two.” 
 
 And Sept. 23 is 33 days since the Aug. 21 total solar eclipse, which Meade believes is an omen. 
 
 Capital Weather Gang's Angela Fritz takes us back in time to show how mankind has reacted to eclipses over thousands of years. (Claritza Jimenez,Daron Taylor,Angela Fritz/The Washington Post) 
 
 He points to the Book of Revelation, which he said describes the image that will appear in the sky on that day, when Nibiru is supposed to rear its ugly head, eventually bringing fire, storms and other types of destruction. 
 
 [Will the mysterious shadow planet Nibiru obliterate Earth in October? No.] 
 
 The book describes a woman “clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet and a crown of twelve stars on her head” who gives birth to a boy who will “rule all the nations with an iron scepter” while she is threatened by a red seven-headed dragon. The woman then grows the wings of an eagle and is swallowed up by the earth. 
 
 The belief, as previously described by Gary Ray, a writer for Unsealed, is that the constellation Virgo — representing the woman — will be clothed in sunlight, in a position that is over the moon and under nine stars and three planets. The planet Jupiter, which will have been inside Virgo — in her womb, in Ray’s interpretation — will move out of Virgo, as though she is giving birth. 
 
 To make clear, Meade said he’s not saying the world will end Saturday. Instead, he claims, the prophesies in the Book of Revelation will manifest that day, leading to a series of catastrophic events that will happen over the course of weeks. 
 
 “The world is not ending, but the world as we know it is ending,” he said, adding later: “A major part of the world will not be the same the beginning of October.” 
 
 Meade’s prediction has been dismissed as a hoax not only by NASA scientists, but also by people of faith. 
 
 Ed Stetzer, a professor and executive director of Wheaton College’s Billy Graham Center for Evangelism, first took issue with how Meade is described in some media articles. 
 
 “There’s no such thing as a Christian numerologist,” he told The Post. “You basically got a made-up expert in a made-up field talking about a made-up event.… It sort of justifies that there’s a special secret number codes in the Bible that nobody believes.” 
 
 Meade said he never referred to himself as a Christian numerologist. He’s a researcher, he said, and he studied astronomy at a university in Kentucky, though he declined to say which one, citing safety reasons. His website says he worked in forensic investigations and spent 10 years working for Fortune 1000 companies. He’s also written books. The most recent one is called “Planet X — The 2017 Arrival.” 
 
 Stetzer said that while numbers do have significance in the Bible, they shouldn’t be used to make sweeping predictions about planetary motions and the end of Earth. 
 
 [For some, eclipse day showcases God’s majesty. For others, it means the Rapture is coming.] 
 
 “Whenever someone tells you they have found a secret number code in the Bible, end the conversation,” he wrote in an article published Friday in Christianity Today. “Everything else he or she says can be discounted.” 
 
 That is not to say that Christians don’t believe in the Bible’s prophesies, Stetzer said, but baseless theories that are repeated and trivialized embarrass people of faith. 
 
 “We do believe some odd things,” he said. “That Jesus is coming back, that he will set things right in the world, and no one knows the day or the hour.” 
 
 The doomsday date was initially predicted to be in May 2003, according to NASA. Then it was moved to Dec. 21, 2012, the date that the Mayan calendar, as some believed, marked the apocalypse. 
 
 Morrison, the NASA scientist, has given simple explanations debunking the claim that a massive planet is on course to destroy Earth. If Nibiru is, indeed, as close as conspiracy theorists believe to striking Earth, astronomers, and anyone really, would’ve already seen it. 
 
 “It would be bright. It would be easily visible to the naked eye. If it were up there, you could see it. All of us could see it. … If Nibiru were real and it were a planet with a substantial mass, then it would already be perturbing the orbits of Mars and Earth. We would see changes in those orbits due to this rogue object coming in to the inner solar system,” Morrison said in a video. 
 
 Doomsday believers also say that Nibiru is on a 3,600-year orbit. That means it had already come through the solar system in the past, which means we should be looking at an entirely different solar system today, Morrison said. 
 
 “Its gravity would’ve messed up the orbits of the inner planets, the Earth, Venus, Mars, probably would’ve stripped the moon away completely,” he said. “Instead, in the inner solar system, we see planets with stable orbits. We see the moon going around the Earth.” 
 
 And if Nibiru is not a planet and is, in fact, a brown dwarf, as some claims suggest — again, we would’ve already seen it. 
 
 “Everything I’ve said would be worse with a massive object like a brown dwarf,” Morrison said. “That would’ve been tracked by astronomers for a decade or more, and it would already have really affected planetary objects.” 
 
 Some call Nibiru “Planet X,” as Meade did in the title of his book. Morrison said that’s a name astronomers give to planets or possible objects that have not been found. For example, when space scientists were searching for a planet beyond Neptune, it was called Planet X. And once it was found, it became Pluto. 
 
 Stetzer encouraged Christians to be critical, especially in an information era marred with fake news stories. 
 
 “It’s simply fake news that a lot of Christians believe the world will end on September 23,” Stetzer wrote. “Yet, it is still a reminder that we need to think critically about all the news.” 
 
 He took issue with a Fox News story with a headline that appears to give credence to the doomsday claim — and was published in the Science section under the label “Planets.” 
 
 “Every time end-of-the-world predictions resurface in the media, it is important that we ask ourselves, ‘Is this helpful?’ ” Stetzer wrote. “Is peddling these falsehoods a good way to contribute to meaningful, helpful discussions about the end of times?” 
 
 Julie Zauzmer contributed to this story. 
 
 Read more: 
 
 ‘Black moon’ rising: No, it’s not the apocalypse 
 
 More people searched the Bible for “end times” because of same-sex marriage than because of Trump 
 
 Don’t panic, humanity’s ‘doomsday’ seed vault is probably still safe ||||| Mark it in your calendar, folks: The world is going to end on Saturday. At least, that's according to David Meade, a numerologist who has predicted that the end times will begin on September 23. Needless to say, we're not holding our breath. 
 
 Meade takes his inspiration from the Bible's Book of Revelations, specifically Revelation 12:1–2, which reads: 
 
 A great sign appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet and a crown of twelve stars on her head. She was pregnant and cried out in pain as she was about to give birth. 
 
 Meade interprets this passage as referring to the constellation of Virgo, which is often depicted as a woman. Currently, Virgo advances through the sky ahead of the moon, and with the sun. Ahead of the constellation are the nine stars of Leo, along with the planets Mercury, Mars, and Venus. Meade believes these stars and planets are the "crown of twelve stars" in the prophecy. 
 
 There's quite a bit more to Meade's story, but the agent of his apocalypse appears to be the planet "Nibiru," a mystical planet that often shows up in doomsday predictions. While a ninth planet may actually exist in the far reaches of our solar system, that still doesn't make Meade's prediction seem particularly sound. 
 
 Meade says he's not actually predicting that the world will end immediately on Saturday. In an interview with the Washington Post, Mead says, "The world is not ending, but the world as we know it is ending" on September 23. "A major part of the world will not be the same the beginning of October." 
 
 Of course, what that means is anyone's guess, which means Meade will be free to interpret even the smallest of possible signs as proof that he was right all along. But for those not taken in by superstitious nonsense, some small comfort: The only way the world will end is if we end it ourselves. 
 
 Source: Washington Post ||||| The night of September 27-28 will showcase a lunar eclipse coupled with a "supermoon": a full moon that appears larger because it's at perigee, the closest point of its orbit with Earth. The concurrence is relatively rare, having not happened since 1982 
 
 Though some observers are viewing the date with fear -- calling the eclipse a "blood moon" -- for astronomers and stargazers, the event is to be welcomed with celebration. 
 
 "It's a beautiful sight in the nighttime sky," said Mark Hammergren, an astronomer at Chicago's Adler Planetarium . "It's a way of connecting us to the universe at large. It gives us this view that there's a bigger picture than just what we're concerned with in our daily lives." 
 
 The entire eclipse, from first shadow to last, will be visible from most of the Americas -- including the eastern half of the United States -- Greenland, Western Europe, western Africa north of the equator and parts of Antarctica. Other portions of the world, including western North America, the rest of Europe and Africa and a swath of western Asia, will see most of the drama, though they'll miss the first or fading bites of the moon. 
 
 In the United States, observatories are hosting a variety of festivities to showcase the eclipse and supermoon. 
 
 Can't make it to a planetarium? NASA TV will have live eclipse coverage that you can watch in the comfort of your own home. 
 
 Or you can walk outside. 
 
 "You don't have to be anyplace special. If you can see the moon, you can just look up," said the Griffith's curator, Laura Danly. 
 
 The Earth's shadow will start making its way across the moon at 8:11 p.m. ET. The total eclipse begins at 10:11 p.m. ET and will peak at 10:47 p.m. ET. The total eclipse will last about 72 minutes. 
 
 A sign of turmoil? 
 
 Hammergren points out that these astronomical events link humanity to history. We've been watching the skies for thousands of years, creating mythology, arriving at scientific discoveries and simply taking pleasure in the movement of celestial bodies. 
 
 "Astronomy, in particular, is something that hooks us up to our most ancient roots," he said. 
 
 For some, astronomy also provides clues to earthly futures -- and this particular "blood moon," as some end-times believers call the lunar eclipse for the reddish tint of the earth's shadow, is revealing of particularly troubled times to come. 
 
 Photos: Photos: Doomsdays throughout time Photos: Photos: Doomsdays throughout time Doomsdays throughout time – From biblical times to the present, the end of the world has been anticipated many times. CNN asked Lorenzo DiTommaso, religion professor and author of the book "The Architecture of Apocalypticism," to describe end of the world predictions throughout history. Hide Caption 1 of 14 Photos: Photos: Doomsdays throughout time Doomsdays throughout time – The Bible's book of Genesis tells how the wickedness and corruption of humankind saddens God to such a point that he unleashes a huge flood to wipe out almost all life on Earth. But before he does, he commands Noah to build an ark to save his family and two of each living creature -- one male, one female. The rain lasts 40 days and 40 nights, after which the floodwaters cover the Earth for 150 days. In some Christian views, Noah's flood was the deluge of the world by water, and it will be followed by future judgment and destruction by fire. Hide Caption 2 of 14 Photos: Photos: Doomsdays throughout time Doomsdays throughout time – The most famous Jewish apocalypse is the book of Daniel, the final part of which was written about 165 B.C. The book is both an apocalypse and apocalyptic. It contains predictions about the end of time and foretells the rise and fall of four great empires. Daniel chapters 2 and 7 claim the end will come after the fall of the fourth empire. Daniel 8 and 9 lay out specific timetables, while Daniel 12 offers a brief description of final judgment and a promise of individual resurrection. Along with the book of Revelation, Daniel has had great influence on subsequent apocalyptic speculation and end-time timetables. Hide Caption 3 of 14 Photos: Photos: Doomsdays throughout time Doomsdays throughout time – This final book of the New Testament dates from the last decade of the first century A.D. It describes the coming doom in great detail, laying out a sequence of plagues, pestilence, chaos and cosmic catastrophe. Its themes and images are an indelible part of the apocalyptic idiom. Some examples include the number 666 as the "mark of the beast," the expectation of a final battle (Armageddon) and a New Jerusalem that will descend from heaven. Unlike much apocalyptic literature, Revelation does not pinpoint a precise doomsday date. This has allowed people of later centuries to interpret the book's message in their own way and to believe, in some cases, that the end will come in their time. Hide Caption 4 of 14 Photos: Photos: Doomsdays throughout time Doomsdays throughout time – The "Apocalypse of Pseudo-Methodius" is arguably the most influential of hundreds of apocalyptic texts composed by Christians, Jews and Muslims during the Middle Ages. Written in Syriac (an Aramaic dialect), almost certainly in the seventh century, it was quickly translated into Greek, Latin and other languages. Pseudo-Methodius coincided with the rise of Islam, and its message comforted Christians living in Mediterranean and Middle Eastern lands. It promised the coming of an end-time emperor who would vanquish Muslims, confound the enemies of Christ and restore the glories of Rome. Hide Caption 5 of 14 Photos: Photos: Doomsdays throughout time Doomsdays throughout time – The Anabaptists were Reformation Christians in 16th- and 17th-century Europe. Melchior Hoffman, an Anabaptist visionary and prophet, proclaimed that a new era would begin in 1533. Strasbourg, now in France, would be the epicenter of the event and the location of the New Jerusalem. When the apocalypse didn't happen, some followers blamed flawed calculations. They said Munster, now in Germany, would be the second coming site, and this led to the Munster Rebellion of 1534-35, when Anabaptists tried to establish a radical theocracy in the city. The Amish and the Mennonites are among the groups that descended from the Anabaptists. Hide Caption 6 of 14 Photos: Photos: Doomsdays throughout time Doomsdays throughout time – Sabbatai Zevi, a young Kabbalah scholar, lived in Smyrna (now Izmir in Turkey). In 1648 he announced he was the long-awaited messiah. Jews believed the messiah would come that year and shepherd in the end of days. When 1648 came and went without incident, rabbis censured and then banished Sabbatai Zevi from Smyrna. He traveled for 15 years and adopted the Christian apocalyptic speculation that the end would come in 1666. Anticipating the overthrow of the sultan in Constantinople, he and his followers headed that way in early 1666, only to be imprisoned. Taken before the sultan, he converted to Islam on the spot, as did many followers, thereby ending his mass movement. Hide Caption 7 of 14 Photos: Photos: Doomsdays throughout time Doomsdays throughout time – The "Great Disappointment" was the most notorious example of a failed doomsday prophecy in American religious history. In the 1830s, after crunching numbers derived from biblical prophecy, Baptist preacher William Miller became convinced the end-time events and second coming of Jesus would occur between March 21, 1843, and March 21, 1844. When nothing happened, others recalculated and said the date would be October 22, 1844. The repeated failure of these apocalyptic predictions greatly disappointed evangelicals. Rather than suppress future apocalyptic speculations, however, the experience galvanized evangelical Christianity in the United States. Hide Caption 8 of 14 Photos: Photos: Doomsdays throughout time Doomsdays throughout time – "Marian Keech" (an alias used by sociologists who infiltrated her group) led a tiny doomsday sect. She had earlier been a part of L. Ron Hubbard's Dianetics movement before he created Scientology. She claimed spiritual beings on the planets Cerus and Clarion told her a flood would destroy Chicago on December 21, 1954. A visitor would arrive at midnight on December 20 to take her group to a waiting spacecraft and salvation. When nothing appeared, she said the group's piety helped change God's mind. The incident inspired the book "When Prophecy Fails," introducing the public to the term cognitive dissonance, the mental turmoil provoked by holding contradictory ideas simultaneously. Hide Caption 9 of 14 Photos: Photos: Doomsdays throughout time Doomsdays throughout time – A 1966 pamphlet published by the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society, an organization of the Jehovah's Witnesses, mentioned that the seventh period of human history, which was to last 1,000 years, would begin in 1975. Although never a part of official doctrine, the view that the world would end in 1975 came to be accepted by many members and profoundly affected the outlook and public activities of the religion. Hide Caption 10 of 14 Photos: Photos: Doomsdays throughout time Doomsdays throughout time – The Branch Davidians (a distant offshoot of the Seventh-day Adventist Church) became a household name when members killed four U.S. agents in a 1993 shootout at the group's compound near Waco, Texas. After a 51-day standoff, the FBI stormed the compound. An ensuing fire left nearly 80 Branch Davidians dead, including their leader and prophet David Koresh. During the standoff, Koresh worked to decipher the seven seals of the book of Revelation, which he thought would explain the group's situation. The Branch Davidians were one of several apocalyptic movements since the 1970s to result in tragedy, including Jim Jones' Peoples Temple. Hide Caption 11 of 14 Photos: Photos: Doomsdays throughout time Doomsdays throughout time – Marshall Herff Applewhite and Bonnie Lu Nettles founded a theology that blended biblical apocalypticism and science fiction. The Earth, they said, was a stepping stone to a higher evolutionary state. They were convinced the planet, which they likened to a garden, was so full of weeds that God (actually an alien from the evolutionary level above human) would plow it under, or recycle it. In March 1997, 39 members committed suicide in Rancho Santa Fe, outside San Diego, California, to escape the prophesized doom. They believed a spaceship, traveling alongside the comet Hale-Bopp, would transmit their souls to their evolutionary destination. Hide Caption 12 of 14 Photos: Photos: Doomsdays throughout time Doomsdays throughout time – Some Christians thought the end date would be May 21, 2011. That's when their biblical calculations told them the Rapture would occur, when the righteous remnant of the world's population would be saved. But that date would also bring an enormous earthquake, draw bodies up from graves and mark the beginning of five apocalyptic months before the world would finally end on October 21. The best-known proponent of this belief was Harold Camping, founder of Family Radio, a Christian broadcasting ministry. Camping previously claimed that the world would end on September 6, 1994. Hide Caption 13 of 14 Photos: Photos: Doomsdays throughout time Doomsdays throughout time – According to the 2012 theory, data recorded in the Mayan "Long Count" calendar suggested the present age would end on December 21, 2012. The 2012 prediction combines old-school apocalyptic notions with a nonbiblical (Mayan) timetable. Some expected a cosmic calamity on the order of Revelation. Others anticipated an alignment of the planets or the sudden inclusion of a new celestial body. Still others thought 2012 would usher in a spiritual transformation. The Internet -- not to mention Hollywood -- played a huge role in shaping the 2012 message, allowing people around the world to participate in what became a global, multicultural phenomenon. Hide Caption 14 of 14 
 
 The eclipse is said to be the last of a "tetrad," four consecutive total lunar eclipses, each separated by six lunar months, that took place on Jewish holidays. (The first three in the current series took place April 15, 2014; October 8, 2014; and April 4, 2015.) Some Christian ministers have theorized that the sequence has earth-shaking significance, noting that other tetrads took place in key years in history, including 1492 (Jewish expulsion from Spain) and 1948 (a Mideast war). 
 
 "The coming four blood moons points to a world-shaking event that will happen between April 2014 and October 2015," he said. 
 
 And Mark Blitz, head of El Shaddai Ministries and the author of "Blood Moons: Decoding the Imminent Heavenly Signs," says God is trying to get humanity's attention -- and we ignore it at our peril. 
 
 "There are always the naysayers and the agnostics when it comes to God trying to reach mankind in His urgent message to repent," he told World News Daily , which has been charting the eclipse's arrival with headlines such as " 'Blood Moons' expert: Get on God's calendar" and "Coming solar eclipse seen as 'judgment.' " 
 
 "Here we have had four total lunar eclipses in a row on Passover and Tabernacles," he said. "And just look what is happening in the world today!" 
 
 Skeptics have pointed out that claims made of "blood moons" -- a term that has arisen only in the past few years, Hammergren says -- should be taken with at least a few grains of salt . After all, their coincidence with Jewish holidays is logical, since the Jewish calendar is a lunar calendar, and some tetrads' occurrence in significant historical years is an example of confirmation bias: looking for connections that fit preconceived notions. 
 
 "Some people look at it as being a portent of doom. That is not uncommon," said the Griffith's Danly. "But it really isn't. It is the alignment of the sun and the moon." 
 
 Added the Adler's Hammergren, "People have been predicting the end of the world for thousands of years in recorded history, and not a single time has that come about." 
 
 'It's a great entry point' 
 
 One prediction that's still being refined is one of the most basic: the weather. 
 
 On Sunday afternoon, CNN Weather reported that viewing conditions will be poor in the Southeast with low visibility stretching along the Gulf Coast up into parts of the Ohio Valley and the Mid-Atlantic. 
 
 New England will be the exception in the East, with clear skies mostly north of Massachusetts. 
 
 The Midwest through most of the lower Central Plains should offer fair to good conditions for viewing, but a front is expected to move through the Northern Plains, bringing clouds to the front's boundary from Minnesota through the Dakotas. 
 
 Out West, where the eclipse will be partial, clear conditions are expected. 
 
 Hammergren points out the supermoon eclipse is one of those events best viewed with the naked eye (though binoculars can come in handy), so anywhere there's a clear sky will do the trick. 
 
 Danly concurs. "It is a beautiful sight," she said. 
 
 It's also a great chance for astronomers to educate folks who may spend more time staring down at a screen than looking up at the sky. 
 
 "It's a great entry point," Hammergren said. " 'You think the lunar eclipse is neat? Let me tell about this other stuff going on.' " 
 
 But don't miss your chance at Sunday's supermoon eclipse. The next one isn't due until 2033.
– If you had big plans this weekend, David Meade regrets to inform you that the world will be ending Saturday. Meade, a Christian numerologist and self-described "researcher," says Sept. 23 is foretold in the Bible's Book of Revelation as the day a series of catastrophic events will begin, and as a result, "a major part of the world will not be the same," the Washington Post reports. The Bible prophecies a woman "clothed with the sun" and a "crown of 12 stars" giving birth to a boy who will "rule all the nations" while she fights off a seven-headed dragon. The woman, Meade says, is the constellation Virgo, which on Saturday will be positioned under nine stars and three planets, per Popular Mechanics. The baby boy will be the planet Jupiter, which will be moving out of Virgo on that night. According to Meade, who says he studied astronomy at an unspecified university in Kentucky, the great change in our world will be the result of the arrival of Nibiru, a planet famous in conspiracy circles but which astronomers say doesn't exist. David Morrison, a senior space scientist at NASA, says that if Nibiru were really on a collision course with Earth, we would have seen it by now. "It would be bright," he says, per the Post. "It would be easily visible to the naked eye." But that's not dissuading Meade, who points to the fact that Sept. 23 falls 33 days after last month's total solar eclipse as proof of his prophecy. "Jesus lived for 33 years. The name Elohim, which is the name of God to the Jews, was mentioned 33 times [in the Bible]," Meade says. "It's a very biblically significant, numerologically significant number."