There’s a story that hit the Internet about a month ago that went absolutely viral in the last week. It’s about a supposed government operation that “is above TOP SECRET” titled “Project Anchor”.

The story is about two black holes that collided in outer space some 1.3 billion years ago producing a gravitational wave which will hit Earth like the sun through a magnifying glass. It is thought that space will make the wave even greater and, on August 12th of 2026, this gravitational wave will hit our planet and gravity on Earth will cease for 7 Seconds. Experts are supposedly claiming that there is a 94.7% chance that this event will happen this year, and they are not only predicting the date, but also the time (14:33 UTC – 9:33 AM-EST).

In the video at the top of this article, they open with a story supposedly originating at the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO) in Livingston, Louisiana. This is an actual observatory found here.

However, when we searched for “Project Anchor” and the date “8/12/2026” neither was found on their website.

This video also mentions a scientist by the name of Dr. Thomas Webb, an employee of LIGO until just recently, who supposedly discovered these black holes in space.

Again, we found no such person working as a scientist in this capacity in LIGO.

So the story goes on that Dr. Webb sent his findings on to his academic advisor in graduate school at MIT, Dr. Mji Park.

Again, no such person at MIT or anywhere else in America’s higher education system exists.

The story goes Dr. Webb became frantic and called Dr. Park saying, “Mji, I really need you to call me back!”

“Thereafter (supposedly) Webb’s paper with his finding was retracted. His data access was suspended. His university (California Institute of Technology) placed him on administrative leave. On February 14th, Thomas Webb walked out of his apartment. His car was found 3 days later at a rest stop in New Mexico… engine still running. Thomas Webb has not been seen since.

Dr. Park received a flash drive a week later. No return address. She opened it, ran the calculations, and understood why Tom sounded so paranoid. She copied everything to three separate servers. Then she started making phone calls, and within 48 hours, Dr. Park would be dead.”

How can two people who don’t exist go missing or die?

CONCLUSION:

I opted to write this article because the video has been viewed over 2 million times in 17 days! For some odd reason, Americans love to hear story about their demise, right down to the day, date, and hour.

This hoax took me back to December of 1999 at the college where I was teaching. While us techies were dealing with Microsoft and IT relative to our CAD/CAM computer hardware and software correctly rolling over to 01/01/2000, others on our teaching staff and in the administration were worried about the power grid and infrastructure collapsing and all of us dying.

The only other time when I saw this kind of absolute panic is when we had an active shooter drill on our campus and the same class of characters “were absolutely losing their sh*t”. Even though these highly educated educators knew this active shooter drill was a simulation involving actors playing roles, they still were in a panic.  

This story also took me back to childhood when my mother told me the story about the Aesop’s fable “The Boy Who Cried Wolf”. The story showed the importance of always telling the truth.

Now, before somebody accuses me of disrespecting “The Why Files” creator Andrew Gentile and his sidekick Heckle Fish Moriarti, I genuinely like this guy and his content. I only opted to use his video as an example as he is the most prominent and had the most views of all of the many other YouTube videos on the topic of “Project Anchor”.

My problem with Gentile was that he did not give a disclaimer or spell out the truth until near the end of his 47 minute video when he concludes:

“Project Anchor is zooming around the internet, terrifying everybody. And today we saw why. Losing gravity, even for a few seconds, would be a disaster.

So, should you be afraid? Should you start buying ceiling anchors and cables? No. Project Anchor is a hoax.

The leaked document first appeared on Tik Tok and Instagram in late December 2025, and it’s pure fiction. There’s no $89 billion program. There’s no 94.7 probability calculation. NASA has never monitored gravitational waves that could intersect near Earth. That’s not how gravitational waves even work. They’re ripples in space itself, not beams that can collide. But the story went so viral that NASA was forced to issue a public statement. Earth will not lose gravity for 7 seconds on August 12th, 2026, or any other time for that matter. The only way Earth could suddenly lose its gravity would be if the planet suddenly lost its mass.”

I think this video, and all similar videos, should be prefaced with a disclaimer at the beginning of the video, since you have people who suffer with panic attacks, those who are actual heart patients, and those medicated for mental issues who might be affected negatively.

© 2026 by Mark S. Schwendau

Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Thinking Conservative.