  In a recent publication (1612.00266), we demonstrated that the events in the
first observing run of the Advanced LIGO gravitational wave observatory (aLIGO
O1) showed tentative evidence for repeating "echoes from the abyss" caused by
Planck-scale structure near black hole horizons. By considering a
phenomenological echo model, we showed that the pure noise hypothesis is
disfavored with a p-value of 1%, i.e. higher amplitude for echoes than those in
aLIGO O1 events are only recovered in 1% of random noise realizations. A recent
preprint by Westerweck, et al. (1712.09966) provides a careful re-evaluation of
our analysis which claims "a reduced statistical significance ... entirely
consistent with noise". It is a mystery to us why the authors make such a
statement, while they also find a p-value of 2 $\pm$ 1% (given the Poisson
error in their estimate) for the same model and dataset. This is p-erfectly
consistent with our results, which would be commonly considered as disfavoring
the null hypothesis, or "moderate to significant" evidence for "echoes".
Westerweck, et al. also point to diversity of the observed echo properties as
evidence for statistical fluke, but such a diversity is neither unique nor
surprising for complex physical phenomena in nature.
