update:
I finally got to see it. That CNN video was the same video shot
by the Idaho NG security cams. A great event indeed. A lil scary
though since no mention of it before it penetrated our system.

A couple individuals from the TU24 thread said they thought
that it is gonna be the one that we don't see that gets us.
I'm beginning to think they were right since this one had no notice
whatsoever. I thought the NEO people were supposed to see
stuff like this coming. But I didn't read about it anywhere.
WOW !!! what a goof !!!!

wonder what kind of fireworks that Planet-X is gonna
leave behind ???

Lastly, anybody in the area of this thing coming down,
I'd suggest you folks going out there and see if you can
find some small fragments of it. These babies would sell
like hotcakes on E-Bay !!!! (hint, hint)

Good luck on your expedition

I bet there is an ATS'er here that lives close enough to find where it hit. With an explosion that big, it shouldn't be too hard.

Please someone go out there and find the crater and take a pic! I'll buy you dinner if you do it.

wow I just saw the footage of it on fox news detroit. I wish I lived out there. I'd have to form a search party for whatever may have crashed/hit. unless the gov. beat us to it.

I've seen some good meteors and they look like what I saw on that one security cam. We heard noises during the 2001 storm but they we're faint. The things would start with a trail and then get real bright and then out.

Did the thing land or not? This was no TU24. This was smaller.

What about the eyewitness that said it looked like a flat front and made of many pieces? Weird!

Sneaky little devils aren't they?

Happily whizzing around the galaxy until some larger piece of rock gets in it's way, and poof!

Of the estimated 50,000 NEO's in our solar system, less than 20,000 have been identified.

Scary huh?

Originally posted by mrsdudara
Im no pro, but it is going to take a hell of a lot to convince me that, that thing was a meteor. Im not buying it.

I'm not of the same theory as you but it would make
a great science fiction movie if the LHC opened up a wormhole
and the aliens on the other end sent in a meteor as a test
(like us throwing a rock in a well to see how far it is to the bottom).
And we missed it coming in thru space cuz it bypassed all the
telescopes due to the late appearing out of the wormhole.

Guess the aliens found the bottom of the well ...... LOL

now there's a story line for hollywood

What material does a white, blue-white explosion indicate? I also see that as it passed over other areas it was identified to have a white-green tail, which seems to indicate a copper and ?? component. Also wondering if the intensity of the final flare and the fact eye-witnesses report TWO explosions; one following the other by a few seconds, would indicate a sonic boom AND impact?



[edit on 20-2-2008 by Yknot]

Originally posted by SimonSays
update:
I thought the NEO people were supposed to see
stuff like this coming. But I didn't read about it anywhere.

I think you're confusing meteors and asteroids. Asteroids are are very large - some 10km across or more and orbit the sun mainly between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter. Some of them are 'Earth Crossing Asteroids' and these are the one's that the NEO people concentrate on.

Meteors on the other hand are very small - usually specks of fine dust which are the remnants of comet tails. Each of the annual meteor showers are of this nature. What happened here, if it is a meteor, is that it was a small rock.

It wouldn't have to be very large to have the effect it did due to the amount of kinetic energy generated by its journey through the atmosphere. If indeed, this is the nature of it, I would be surprised if there were not fragments that survived all the way to ground as meteorites!

Of course, it could have been a piece of space debris falling back to earth, that could account for the colours witnessed as space debris would contain metal

I've had my encounter with an amazing Green Meteor as discussed in depth before on ATS. My encounter was completely silent however, yet was brilliant in visual perspective. People are comparing it to a transformer burst? I've been around two of those before, and one time it scared the bejeezus out of me. Not many things make me jump, but I was down in Florida about a year ago and was sitting in this rec room with large windows facing the back street. I was talking with a friend of mine who lives there, and all of the sudden I heard a loud *POP*, and then the windows all vibrated.

The first thought that came to my mind was an explosion, it really surprised the living you know what out of me, as I had my back right against one of the window panes. I walked outside with my friend, and he told me it was the Transformer down at the nearby Fire Station. He said it had done that a few times before. I heard some folks in the parking lot discussing it, they were right there outside when it happened, and the one lady basically dropped to the ground due to the concussion of the blow. It gave quite a concussive blast as I had felt like someone threw a huge rock at the window I was near. There were plenty of nearby buildings between the Fire Station and us, but the angle between the Telephone-Pole mounted Transformer, and where we were located, was basically direct line of sight. Sound can greatly intensify between buildings, and that's what happened.

The second time I was out during a Hurricane and I saw a Transformer blow across the way, it lit up everything green from the copper wiring, but in opposition to the other experience, it did not give off a single sound. It was quite a sight to behold with sparks flying everywhere and green flashes pulsating up into the sky.



Yes, Meteors do make noise, sometimes even sizzling and crackling as they pass overhead. What you undoubtedly heard was the Meteor breaking the Sound Barrier as it flew by. If so, it would have sounded like a loud, yet short clap of thunder. Yes, it would also sound exactly like the blowing of a transformer, at least in the way I heard one. I've heard many jets producing sonic booms, and from the one transformer blow I witnessed they had similar effects (loud "BOOM", concussive energy, rattling windows).

As a side note, I figure I should bring this to your attention if you haven't already heard of it. About 3-4 years ago I believe you all up in the Washington/Oregon area had a mass sighting similar to what you are describing now. Many Green Meteors, a lot of noise producers, and quite a few that actually became full-fledged Meteorites. I cannot for the life of me find the information right now, although I know I have it somewhere, but about 150-165 days prior to those sightings there was a radio message put out with a T-minus Countdown. The message came out in January, and the Meteor Mass sighting occured in June. It was also discovered that during that time NASA NEO was keeping track of a possible NEO that happened to be an Asteroid.

I am not one to jump to conclusions, and definitely not one to believe fanciful stories, but for all intents and purposes, when all of the events were put into context, all evidence pointed at a successful missile/rocket intercept of an NEO. Nobody jumped to these conclusions, I simply came up with it. I heard the January report of the Countdown. That was all I heard, and I just took it with a grain of salt. However, around the time period forward mentioned during Countdown there happened to be MASSIVE meteor sightings that were totally unprescedented, and record breaking in their intensity. I also came upon the currently tracked NEO during my investigation into possibly connecting the two reports. Put together these two incidents, along with the tracking record, compromised an event that just had to many factors of "coincidence" to actually be coincidental.

[edit on 2-20-2008 by TheAgentNineteen]

Originally posted by SimonSays

I thought the NEO people were supposed to see
stuff like this coming. But I didn't read about it anywhere.
WOW !!! what a goof !!!!

Far too many space-based objects collide with the Earth on a daily basis to track every single itty bitty one. If you are in a dark enough environment, such as out to sea, you can witness Meteors flash overhead every few seconds. The Earth is bombarded 24 Hours a Day, 7 Days a Week, 365 Days a Year. Most however pass overhead barely noticed by in large, as city lights, buildings, and countless hours of daylight obscure their visibility. Most brilliant Meteors are no larger than a grain of sand, and the one the OP witnessed was most likely no larger than a baseball. JPL's NEO Division tracks the Asteroids that pose a serious risk to Earth and its inhabitants, which would be objects that after entering and burning in Earths Upper Atmosphere would remain at least the size of a Small Car. Anything smaller than that can still cause damage, but would most likely not have a Tunguska effect.

Originally posted by TheAgentNineteen

JPL's NEO Division tracks the Asteroids that pose a serious risk to Earth and its inhabitants, which would be objects that after entering and burning in Earths Upper Atmosphere would remain at least the size of a Small Car. Anything smaller than that can still cause damage, but would most likely not have a Tunguska effect.

Indeed! The prevailing theory for Tunguska is that it was a small earthbound comet that expoded in the atmosphere due to the fact that comets aren't very dense. It was definately an airblast as the trees at the epicentre remained standing, but charred.
What happened yesterday was certainly of a different nature otherwise it would have killed thousands at least.

this is really cool, and actually kind of scary, let me explain why..

i read this, saw the pics, then the video, and thought, "wow that is very cool", my initial thought was to look into it, read more about it. the video on CNN in particular gives you the impression that the object is falling from the sky directly overhead!, it keeps getting bigger and bigger, the area of light, until the flash, it really gives me the impression it is coming straight at the camera.

so .. that triggered just the tiniest bit of fear/curiosity, which was like "i wonder what its like to witness that first hand, scary?" and my other half thought, "you probably dont even know what happened until you get home and read about it".

but THEN .. i started to imagine the truth, which is, that a near earth object, of which there are tens of thousands, could land directly on top of the exact space that i am inhabiting on this planet Earth. so I began imagining what it is like to have a meteor or -something- fall from the sky directly on top of you, how it would look as it is coming into the atmosphere and landing on you, etc. the more i thought about it, and told myself repeatedly, "think about it .. no seriously, a space rock can squash you like you are meaningless snot at any fraction of any second that goes by. one .. two .. three..". Which is nothing but true ..

so my first thought reaction to that feeling of impending doom was strangely enough to crawl under something. not literally .. i mean i didnt get up and crawl under something nor did i want to but my thought was in that circumstance to hide under the Earth, cover me up! sort of thing, which wouldn't help you in a direct impact, nothing would. so its kind of funny how much fear that really can inspire in an individual .. just wanted to share.

Originally posted by seagull
Apparently the entire Northwest was ablaze with meteorite explosions. KOMO TV in Seattle reports explosions over Whidbey Island. Coeur D'Alene, Idaho reports some as well.

These apparently occurred before, by 2 hours or so, the one that I saw. Interesting, and a little scary.

On a second glance at Komo's page, I think that story is a couple of years old, and isn't related at all to this mornings event. Or am I just an idiot this morning?

[edit on 19-2-2008 by seagull]

Ya we had one over here by Boise actually! I'm so bummed I missed it, but ya it was a meteor the size of a suit case!