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Originally posted by mybigunit
Originally posted by projectvxn
Hmmm. Has someone else noticed how many rocks are coming from the sky lately? Is there something bigger out there we should be worried about?
I was thinking the same exact thing. There have been a lot of meteor sightings and close calls lately. Hmmmmm
Originally posted by projectvxn
Hmmm. Has someone else noticed how many rocks are coming from the sky lately? Is there something bigger out there we should be worried about?
Originally posted by yellowcard
Originally posted by projectvxn
Hmmm. Has someone else noticed how many rocks are coming from the sky lately? Is there something bigger out there we should be worried about?
I find the vast amount of plane crashes to be more disturbing, frankly.
Originally posted by johnsky
I've seen a meteor come down in person... actually two, if you'll believe it.
Meteorites
Another type of interaction between the meteoroid and the atmosphere takes place when the meteoroid is bigger than 20 cm in diameter (for a speed of 15 km/s). In this case the meteoroid doesn't have enough time to loose all its mass. The meteor will during the flight through the atmosphere slow down to a critical speed of about 3 km/s.
The energy that normally would be transported to the surface of the meteor is not large enough anymore to keep the temperature above 2200K. Since the meteor still has some of its' mass left, the molten surface layer will cool and form a crust on the surface.
When this happens, the meteor or the fireball (when it reaches magnitude -8 or brighter), will fade due to the low velocity. The velocity is not large enough to cause neither evaporation nor radiation. The remaining mass amounts to 10 grams or more.
What's left of the meteor falls to the ground in dark flight, and the speed is reduced to that of a free falling body. The dark flight usually lasts for several minutes, in sharp contrast to the mere seconds' duration of the brilliant fireball.
Larger rocks
The third type of interaction between meteoroids and the atmosphere is a rare phenomenon. If the meteoroid is bigger than a few meters in diameter, the retardation through the atmosphere will be low. The body will disintegrate only slightly. It will hit the surface of the Earth with a velocity of several km/s, and make a meteorite crater. Evaporating substances will make the meteor shine until it hits the ground.
Abstract
A fireball was photographed with a luminous trajectory below a height of 20 km. On Aug. 3, 1984, seven stations photographed this slow moving fireball, which traversed 94 km of luminous trajectory in 9.2 sec and terminated its visible flight at a height of 19.1 km. The computed dark flight trajectory intersected the surface close to Valec, a small village 40 km west of Brno. The Valec fireball was the lowest photographed fireball ever. The Valec fireball was photographed by fish eye cameras. The positional precision of all the records were within the range of 1 to 2 minutes of arc. All computations were done using the FIRBAL program, a set of almost 4000 Fortran statements run on EC 1040 computer. The average computed mass at the terminal point, i.e., the predicted mass of the biggest meteorite, was 16 kg. This number is based on the dynamical data at the terminal point solely. Visual data was also collected from occasional observers. This observed phenomenon is discussed.
Originally posted by johnsky
Only the two I saw didn't produce a loud noise... so the meteor they saw must have been either traveling incredibly faster, or was larger than mine.
Originally posted by ThirdJohnAdams
Me and my girlfriend were taking a walk in elizabeth city NC, it appeared very briefly, there is no way anyone could of caught a picture or have been ready to as fast as this thing flew over.
Originally posted by ThirdJohnAdams
It streaked light behind it, not like anything being burned off, but like actually light trailing behind it.
Originally posted by way2slo
There was a really loud Boom in Hampton Roads area tonight that was felt over a 150 mile radius. Some say they seen a large ball or flame. The Police scanner has been blowing up non stop for the past hour. It will be on the news im sure. Almost all my neighbors came out of their houses to see what was going on.
hamptonroads.com
(visit the link for the full news article)
Originally posted by C.H.U.D.
Yeah, they often do that. If it lasts less than a second, it's known as a wake, more, and it's known as a persistent train. I've seen self- luminous persistent trains that have lasted for a few minutes, and there are recorded cases where the train has remains visible for tens of minutes. Neat ain't they!
Originally posted by welivefortheson
i wonder what on earth it could be?
perhaps perhaps some ai V?