Now a group of scientists, including ones from from CalTech, MIT and the LIGO Scientific Collaboration finally found the gravitational waves.
David Reitze is the executive director of the LIGO observatory at CalTech.
“We have detected gravitational waves. We did it! (applause)”
Reitze spoke with others at a press conference in Washington, DC this past week. The scientists announced they were able to see ripples in the fabric of spacetime.
This is what the waves sounded like. Listen for the “chirp” sound at the end:
What are these gravitational waves? Well, imagine throwing a rock into a pond. When the rock hits the flat surface of the water, it creates ripples or waves. Spacetime is like the surface of the water. So that means gravitational waves are like the ripples moving out from where the rock hits the water.