Something "hit the Earth hard" in Alabama, anyone see/hear it?, page 2
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reply posted on 14-1-2012 @ 07:20 PM by C.H.U.D.
reply to post by fusion47


There is a chance that it may have been a meteor.

It's not unusual for a meteor to drop meteorites, which create sonic booms as they fall through the atmosphere. It happens probably at least once a month over the US, if not more.

The booms are often described as "distant thunder", and usually occur a minute or two after the meteor was observed. Would you be able to find out from your friend what the timing of the events was?

It's a bit early yet, but perhaps someone else saw it and will report it to the The American Meteor Society

It's also not unusual that people misidentify meteors, and when they are observed by many people, there are more often than not reports of "aircraft on fire crashing", or even a "UFO". In this case, perhaps not may people saw it, or it was not a meteor, so other reports may not surface.

Some more info on the sbject can be found here: The American Meteor Society Fireball FAQs


reply posted on 14-1-2012 @ 09:14 PM by C.H.U.D.
Originally posted by Immune
i think if it was a meteor it would have registered on the seismographs so i wonder what it was.


The vast majority of meteorites fall to ground relatively innocuously, the original meteoroid or asteroid having disintegrated at high altitude. Most meteoroids are composed of surprisingly fragile material. The sonic booms they make as they fall are usually produced at at least a few tens of km altitude. There are exceptions, but these are extremely rare. In the vast majority of cases where there has been a meteorite fall, there won't be any significant seismic activity..

How big are most meteorites, and do they fall as single objects or clusters of objects?

Meteorite finds range in size from particles weighing only a few grams, up to the largest known specimen: the Hoba meteorite, found in South Africa in 1920, and weighing about 60 tons (54,000 kg). As with the magnitude distribution of meteors, the number of meteorites decreases exponentially with increasing size. Thus, the majority of falls will produce only a few scattered kilograms of material, with large meteorites being quite rare.

Meteorites are known to fall as single, discreet objects; as showers of fragments from a meteor which breaks up during the atmospheric portion of its flight; and (rarely) as multiple individual falls. The initial mass and composition of the meteoroid primarily determine its eventual fate, along with its speed and angle of entry into the atmosphere.

Source: The American Meteor Society

Have a read of the link I posted above. Lots more info on the subject there.
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