Yet another Fireball explodes, shakes homes in Minnesota

So why all these Fireballs (bolides) exploding with magnificent light flashes, sonic booms that shake houses in the past couple of years? I wish we could get a real expert to be straight up about this and quit with the BS about how this is normal, common or just better reporting. These frequent Fireballs are not that common. The large one over Russia in February was the largest since Tunguska 1908. There have been many others reported and now this latest one over Brainerd, MN.

Light, Boom - Bolide

Here are some excerpts from the story from an engineer who studies the skies, who happened to witness this event. His words to his wife just after the house shaking sonic booms was, "Whew, that was a close call!"

“It’s amazing what things can happen,” Wentworth said. On Friday, his wife said the boom sounded like a bomb. If it didn’t break up or come in with glancing blow, it could have provided a significant impact crater. “I’ve lived up here 40 years and can never remember it happening.”

Shows you how rare something like this is.

Wentworth’s Fire in the Sky Observatory near Nisswa is a registered research facility with the Minor Planets Center of the Harvard Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. Friday, Wentworth had just left the observatory for his house when he saw a flash of light off his home’s deck. Sixty seconds later, a sonic boom.

“It surely shook my house,” Wentworth said.

I don't believe that these fireballs are due to Earth passing through an asteroid field either. There is something off with our atmosphere that is allowing meteors that normally would burn up to get much further into our atmosphere and until the experts be straight up about this and admit there is an uptick in these fireballs, I'm going to throw my theory out there once again. I wrote a thread about this back in Feb.

Fireballs, comets and asteroids, oh my!

My belief is that it has to do with everything else that is going haywire right now, such as all the virus and bacteria illnesses worldwide, the animal die-offs, the rise in volcanoes and small earthquakes, and not to mention, the wild and wacky weather extremes. It's the rise in methane gas in our atmosphere. For more info on the methane, check out my thread in my signature below.

Here’s what I think is happening in a nutshell. Methane has been rising at an alarming rate, more so over the Arctic Sea since August of 2010, which we already know traps much more heat from the sun when shortwave infrared attempts to escape the atmosphere but fails. Here’s the thing though, methane is rising high into the upper atmosphere where we can’t even detect it with our conventional methods. We don’t even know how much methane is in the upper atmosphere, which contains the mesosphere where meteors burn up. It’s this layer, the mesosphere, where we see the fast shooting stars on a clear night burning up as they enter the atmosphere.

I’ve been mentioning this fireball phenomenon on this thread since I first wrote it and I’ve even been interested in it as far back as October long before this large rock exploded over Russia on Feb. 15. In the beginning I wasn’t sure how methane levels could have any sort of effect on the fireball phenomenon except that maybe the atmosphere had been damaged somehow. It wasn’t until the massive explosion over Russia that injured over 1,200 people from shattered windows that I decided I really needed to look into this and see if it was possible.

My first search was to study the layers of the atmosphere, where I saw the graph at the website linked that shows meteors burn up in the mesosphere. The website also has additional information about the layers.

Layers of Atmosphere

I then discovered that large amounts of methane have risen to the mesosphere on a scale that we don’t even know. Although it’s all I can do at this point is speculate that the methane has damaged the mesosphere layer of the atmosphere allowing these meteors to enter much deeper before burning out, sometimes even reaching the ground, I think I’m about spot on. Many theories are being offered, such as, we are traveling through an asteroid field. That was offered up after the Russian fireball, but this doesn’t account for the fact that these fireballs have been on the rise for at least the past four months. That would be quite the large asteroid field.

To actually site fireballs like these is extremely rare. You can wait your whole life time and not witness anything like the occurrences that have been witnessed this past year. I still haven't witnessed one of these bolides myself. Until the experts come up with something better than asteroid field or better reporting, I'm going to continue throwing this theory out there.

Edit to add: Here is a story of the third most reported fireball to AMS in its history that occurred over the Midwest the day after Christmas. The story above was for Friday night fireball, so these are two different reports.

Fireball over Midwest



Post-Chri stmas fireball dazzles Midwest

The "extremely bright meteor" made an appearance of Dec. 26 at about 5:30 p.m CST, an American Meteor Society (AMS) news release reported.

"Witnessed described a fireball as bright as the Sun that fragmented into many parts. Several witnesses reported sonic effects associated with the meteors including at least three reports of delayed booms," the report stated.

The AMS has received over 1050 reports of fireball sightings; the reports spanned Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa, Illinois, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska and West Virginia, the Weather Channel reported.

This is two major fireballs in two days. And this line from the story sums up what I've been trying to say;

Spotting such a bright fireball in a well-populated area is a rare event.

reply to post by Rezlooper


There certainly are more of these than ever and with all the videos it would be silly to deny that.
It makes me wonder if it has anything to do with this also.
www.abovetopsecret.com...

Emperor Ming is at it again! I thought Flash Gordon had taken care of him.......

Personally I am unsure if all the fireball sightings are because of better communications technology or if it's an actual increase in the number of events. There might not be an easy answer to your question as our window of experience is pretty damn small relative to the age of the cosmos.

However just to keep my post in line with ATS maybe the current push for space by the worlds wealthiest people and Governments is because they know something we do not. When I get too old to enjoy life I want to get hit smack in the head with the largest meteor the world has ever seen.

I don't mind knowing I am gonna get killed if I know everyone is going with me. The worst part of getting old and dying is missing something you really would have enjoyed. Like personal jet packs and anti-gravity belts...

We're constantly going through 'new' space; the Earth doesn't just orbit the same arc around the sun every year, it's always new to us; never been here before because the sun is in a new part of the galaxy all the time.

Those incoming rocks are mostly the equivalent of dusty space we're plowing into; yeah the recent Russian one was a hair-raiser but a bolide seen over several states isn't that unusual; it's one event with hundreds of reports, in other words.

In my lifetime I've seen several decent sized meteorites coming in and you can go outside on any clear night and see small ones. It's likely that we're hearing more about them now because of the internet and everyone having cameras handy, as well as the proliferation of security cameras and monitoring equipment.

If your methane theory has merit, perhaps the upper atmosphere explosions are being enhanced by occurring in methane-filled air rather than a more homogeneous mix of gases.

2014, the year of the asteroids?

At least I have an appropriate avatar!

As I have little real knowledge of space phenomenon I'd like to ask a question.

Is there any connection between the (supposedly) increased sightings of large meteors and the atmospheric booms people are reporting all over the place? The OP indicated there was a sonic event attached to the sighting.

reply to post by Bassago


I think the booms maybe from the fireballs.

Spaceweather tracks fireballs, however it has not been updated in a few days.

www.spaceweather.com...

reply to post by Rezlooper


You bring up some good points. It seems like the world population is being kept in the dark.

We need good old science for the effects, but I think it's quite probable it's off the charts at that level. Why can't they measure it though? Or perhaps they have but we aren't aware of the data.

If that part of the atmosphere has been compromised what more up there has also been impacted that we are oblivious to?

reply to post by Mamatus

Personally I am unsure if all the fireball sightings are because of better communications technology or if it's an actual increase in the number of events. There might not be an easy answer to your question as our window of experience is pretty damn small relative to the age of the cosmos.

Well having never seen beyond a really great falling star for 50 yeas or so of life, if there is no uptick than my husband and I are just getting lucky.
We have now witnessed 3 each very different than the others in color all huge. From our vantage point they all seem to have gone all the way to the ground one hitting the pacific, the one that hit San Francisco was that last DEC? we watched.

reply to post by Rezlooper


That doesn't look like a fireball to me - more like a giant piece of coral emitting chemtrails.


Aw. Okay. F&S

reply to post by Rezlooper


Let's look at your statement here:

I wish we could get a real expert to be straight up about this and quit with the BS about how this is normal, common or just better reporting. These frequent Fireballs are not that common.

So what explanation would you accept from experts (IE astronomers, etc) ?

It's like having funny tasting water at your house, you call in a plumber who says you have broken pipes outside because of tree roots, and you have a chemist test the water and he/she tells you that your water has a much higher mineral content added to it.
But you refuse their answers and decide that the government must be poisoning the water supply.

If you don't want to hear their answer, then why bother asking? Simply make up your own explanation.

You also do realize what the percentage of the earth is land and what is water, correct? Do you acknowledge that it is completely possible that there have been many of these fireballs in the past, but simply not observed because they were happening over the water, not not over land?

Not everything is a conspiracy, and not everything is being hidden.

Char-Lee
reply to post by Mamatus

 

Personally I am unsure if all the fireball sightings are because of better communications technology or if it's an actual increase in the number of events. There might not be an easy answer to your question as our window of experience is pretty damn small relative to the age of the cosmos.

Well having never seen beyond a really great falling star for 50 yeas or so of life, if there is no uptick than my husband and I are just getting lucky.
We have now witnessed 3 each very different than the others in color all huge. From our vantage point they all seem to have gone all the way to the ground one hitting the pacific, the one that hit San Francisco was that last DEC? we watched.

That;s my point. i don't think you're getting lucky. I'm 42 years old and I've yet to see a real fireball my whole life except last Halloween when the sightings began, I saw a smaller fireball that fragmented somewhat, but not the real deal. And yet, in just the paost year, there have been many folks like yourselves who are witnessing these events for the first time. Sure, fireballs happen, but not like this. I think we are being kept in the dark as some posters have suggested.

bluemooone2
reply to post by Rezlooper

 

There certainly are more of these than ever and with all the videos it would be silly to deny that.
It makes me wonder if it has anything to do with this also.
www.abovetopsecret.com...

Yes, that's an interesting article. Never saw that before. "Puffing Up"

en.m.wikipedia.org...

When it comes to apocalypse', they do not come more spectacular than Ragnarok

For those who are unaware of the Norse apocolypse,
It is scheduled to commence in March of 2014.

Could those loud booms actually be Heimdallr blowing the Gjallarhorn

eriktheawful
reply to post by Rezlooper

 

Let's look at your statement here:

I wish we could get a real expert to be straight up about this and quit with the BS about how this is normal, common or just better reporting. These frequent Fireballs are not that common.

So what explanation would you accept from experts (IE astronomers, etc) ?

It's like having funny tasting water at your house, you call in a plumber who says you have broken pipes outside because of tree roots, and you have a chemist test the water and he/she tells you that your water has a much higher mineral content added to it.
But you refuse their answers and decide that the government must be poisoning the water supply.

If you don't want to hear their answer, then why bother asking? Simply make up your own explanation.

You also do realize what the percentage of the earth is land and what is water, correct? Do you acknowledge that it is completely possible that there have been many of these fireballs in the past, but simply not observed because they were happening over the water, not not over land?

Not everything is a conspiracy, and not everything is being hidden.

So, once again, a silly BS answer. The fireballs have been happening like this but over water and now we're just lucky to be alive this day and age...cuz now they're happening over land. Seriously? It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure this one out...fireballs have increased and as long as someone's argument is that they haven't, then they are spreading disinfo, IMO of course. But, I am one who is paying attention. And many others are as well, as one poster put above, in her 50 years she never witnessed a fireball, but in the last year she has witnessed three.

And I have made up my own explanation...it's in the OP. But, I can still ask. One day we may get a more scientific explanation of what may be occurring, such as some sort of damage to our atmosphere or provide some evidence that it's just space debris or that we are traveling through a rock-filled part of the cosmos. I don't know but don't pee on me and tell me it's raining by saying that it's better reporting, or they are happening over land now instead of water.

My 2014 prediction is a major impact, perhaps more than one.

Anyone want to guess what kind of avatar I had on here in December of 2004 and March of 2011?

I will answer your question with some data pulled from the American Meteor Society.



Now if you notice there is a marked increase in the number of events in the last 4 years, however there is a large increase in the number of reports as well.

This could mean that we are experiencing an increased number of fireball incidents but it could just as easily represent a larger portion of the population reporting fireballs. We simply do not have enough data to determine one way or the other.

reply to post by Rezlooper


Being an avid amateur astronomer, my eyes are constantly on the sky. I have seen plenty of fireballs of all magnitudes, more so during times of meteor showers.

I've also lived all around the world, literally, and have viewed the night skies from many different lat. and logs.

I also spent 10 years in the US Navy, at sea, and have seen many, many, MANY fireballs ranging in magnitude....and so far from land, that I and my shipmates were the only ones to see it.

They do happen over the ocean....where people may or may not see them.

So you have stated that there is a increase in the frequency of these fireballs, and that in NO way can it be attributed to:

Increase in population and humans spreading further into areas that in the past were not high in population density.

That humans are able to dedicate more and more time to observing things like this (unlike some poor soul back in the early 1800's simply farming until it was dark, and then going to bed, why waste the candles and lamp oil? and get up at dawn to go back to farming just to have enough food to survive).

Can not be due to more and more human beings having recording devices....AND.....able to report them better and faster.

That even if it is simply a increase due to denser amounts of asteroid fragments, that in no way has our planet, ever, never gone through this before in it's 4.5 billion year history.

That instead, it MUST be some deep, dark conspiracy. That "we" (who ever we is, please don't include me in that group. I actually spend large amounts of my time looking at the night sky and tracking objects) are all being "kept in the dark"........

Right Ho then. As per most ATS people on here: cite your sources and show this please....

eriktheawful
reply to post by Rezlooper

 

Right Ho then. As per most ATS people on here: cite your sources and show this please....

I've done this repeatedly, now cite yours

eriktheawful
reply to post by Rezlooper

 

Being an avid amateur astronomer, my eyes are constantly on the sky. I have seen plenty of fireballs of all magnitudes, more so during times of meteor showers.

I've also lived all around the world, literally, and have viewed the night skies from many different lat. and logs.

I also spent 10 years in the US Navy, at sea, and have seen many, many, MANY fireballs ranging in magnitude....and so far from land, that I and my shipmates were the only ones to see it.

They do happen over the ocean....where people may or may not see them.

So you have stated that there is a increase in the frequency of these fireballs, and that in NO way can it be attributed to:

Increase in population and humans spreading further into areas that in the past were not high in population density.

That humans are able to dedicate more and more time to observing things like this (unlike some poor soul back in the early 1800's simply farming until it was dark, and then going to bed, why waste the candles and lamp oil? and get up at dawn to go back to farming just to have enough food to survive).

Can not be due to more and more human beings having recording devices....AND.....able to report them better and faster.

That even if it is simply a increase due to denser amounts of asteroid fragments, that in no way has our planet, ever, never gone through this before in it's 4.5 billion year history.

Once again, the same argument...you try to pretend I'm claiming there has never been any fireballs. Wrong...there have been plenty of fireballs, but there are more now. You are once again claiming because in your fortunate experiences that you and only you, should know better than the rest of us...so rest assured, according to you, that these large exploding fireballs that are occurring over the Midwest (I'll use one region for example, the one I actually was born and raised) are common and usual. Yeah, right! Yawn...this is what I'm talking about. You have been blessed to live such an adventurous life that you have had the opportunities (Navy, world traveler and amatuer astronomer all in one, imagine that and how convenient) to see so, so many fireballs...but the rest of us average ordinary folk haven't had those opportunities....so, what does that mean? It means that while it seems steady for you, it's not for me and many others. Why is it that so many are witnessing these events and fireballs are headlining the news, but just a few short years ago, this wasn't the case? In just those few years our population has increased that much to expand into all these unexplored remote areas. I think that you can use that argument over a 100-year span, but we're talking about two or three years. And in regards to the asteroid field...I didn't say that this was impossible...what I would like is some evidence that this could be occurring, but we don't get that. Surely, NASA and all the other space rock and debris trackers could tell us to expect some fireballs because we seem to be traveling through a congested area, wouldn't you think?

Anyways....