No statistical excess in Explorer/Nautilus observations in the year 2001

Abstract

A recent report on gravitational wave detector data from the NAUTILUS and EXPLORER detector groups claims a statistically significant excess of coincident events when the detectors are oriented in a way that maximizes their sensitivity to gravitational wave sources in the galactic plane. While not claiming a detection of gravitational waves, they do strongly suggest that the origin of the excess is of gravitational wave origin. In this note we show that the statistical analysis that led them to the conclusion that there is a statistical excess is flawed and that the reported observation is entirely consistent with the normal Poisson statistics of the reported detector background.Comment: 11 pages, 3 figures, to appear in CQ