Meteorite hits Cuba

They have apparent fragments. Maybe (it's the news, afterall. Might've bought concrete chunks off a local).

"We're receiving reports that a meteor was seen in the sky across the Florida Keys," NWS Key West tweeted, adding that the space rock "likely exploded over the province of Pinar del Río." CNN's Havana correspondent, Patrick Oppmann, described the sound of a "large explosion" in the town of Viñales and posted pictures of the fragments:

theweek.com...

There's a video, but it doesn't show much other than the smoke trail and bewildered Cubans. No apparent doom.


Another link


Everywhere seems to be in the bareones "developing story".

Cuba eh.

Then everyone should get a piece of it.

Considering their gubberment.

The earth or a city is going to hit one day by something that does more than break a few windows and it could happen any day at anytime.

a reply to: 727Sky

There are the infamous lady sitting on her couch who got a bruised hip or thigh and a car in the carport stories. Broken window dmg in Siberia. Probably a few others I haven't heard of. Other than that we seem to have been pretty lucky.

originally posted by: RadioRobert
They have apparent fragments. Maybe (it's the news, afterall. Might've bought concrete chunks off a local).

Sure doesn't look like meteorite chunks.

a reply to: Blue Shift

I thought the same, but I'm trying to presume CNN did more leg work than me...

Why do these meteorites always explode over land without making impact first? Same with tunguska, air burst before impact.

I wonder why? Why these don't strike the earth and cause huge craters?

originally posted by: ClovenSky
Why do these meteorites always explode over land without making impact first? Same with tunguska, air burst before impact.
I wonder why? Why these don't strike the earth and cause huge craters?

The exploding ones are made up of icy rock that superheats when it hits the atmosphere, which makes it shatter and explode. Iron meteorites, like the one that hit Arizona... they can make some pretty big holes.

a reply to: ClovenSky

Basically, we think the drag creates enough force on the leading edge to break it apart. *pop* In the same way at a certain speed water can't get out of the way fast enough to cushion your fall, air is also a fluid. Go through it fast enough and splat.

a reply to: Blue Shift

There is a lot debate on this. Most meteors aren't considered to have icy cores. Just ice collected on the outside. In theory, that ive should ablate/evaporate rather than cause am explosion. Icy comet-like chunks could presumably boil internally faster than they'd be able to release pressures.

originally posted by: RadioRobert
a reply to: Blue Shift

There is a lot debate on this. Most meteors aren't considered to have icy cores. Just ice collected on the outside. In theory, that ive should ablate/evaporate rather than cause am explosion. Icy comet-like chunks could presumably boil internally faster than they'd be able to release pressures.

Cook pretty much any rocky (carbonaceous condritic) meteorite and you'll get water out of it. They don't have to be comets. It just turns out that there is a lot of water locked up in rocks floating around in space. For some reason. Magnetic attraction? Probably not just gravity.

Earth Water from Meteorites

Probably where we got a lot of our oil. Not just dinosaur juice.

a reply to: Blue Shift

You'd need a lot of water content to generate enough strength to cause most "solid" rocks to break apart.

The impact shattered windows and rained charred pieces of rock on people’s homes, startling people and animals alike.

Via RT


They have some satellite imagery of the plume at link.

a reply to: 727Sky

I too agree seems the media has public mesmerized with their view of reality,look around listen to Astronomers and Physicist's who were once thought top in their field,till they tried to reveal the truth,I think at best we have 5 yrs

I live in Key West. Not sure of the exact time when happened, but I missed the event. Most folks I talked did also.

Don't worry, Bruce Willis can destroy those killer asteroids, and Will Smith can kill any of those evil aliens, who are threatening to destroy our planet!!

And NASA is our great savior, protecting all of us, so just relax, folks!

originally posted by: RadioRobert
a reply to: Blue Shift

You'd need a lot of water content to generate enough strength to cause most "solid" rocks to break apart.

It's not, necessarily, the amount of water, as much as the very fast rate at which the heating occurs.

originally posted by: ClovenSky
Why do these meteorites always explode over land without making impact first? Same with tunguska, air burst before impact.

I wonder why? Why these don't strike the earth and cause huge craters?

According to the paper, as a meteoroid hurtles through Earth’s atmosphere, high-pressure air in the front of the object infiltrates cracks and pores in the rock, which generates a great deal of internal pressure. This pressure is so great that it causes the object to effectively blow up from the inside out, even if the material in the meteoroid is strong enough to resist the intense external atmospheric pressures.

“There’s a big gradient between high-pressure air in front of the meteor and the vacuum of air behind it,” said the study’s co-author Jay Melosh, a professor of Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences at Purdue University, in a press release. “If the air can move through the passages in the meteorite, it can easily get inside and blow off pieces.

www.astronomy.com...

a reply to: Mach2

That kind of internal heating doesn't really occur generally because of ablation. So the amount of moisture would have to be large and heated significantly. Which is why modeling shows it is aerodynamic resistance (ie drag) creating all kinds of pressure/temp at the leading edge of the meteor. When the ass-end of the meteor is traveling really fast, and the leading edge is being slowed/pushed/forced back by resistance, it crushes the rock.