Fire in the SkyS


Fireball 5

Bird? Plane? No, it was 'definitely' a meteor across Melbourne skies

Matt Cram
3AW693
Thu, 10 Jul 2014 16:23 UTC
Melbourne Fireball
© 3AW693
Astronomy experts have confirmed a meteor burned across Melbourne skies last night.

Melburnians, as well as people in Gippsland, NSW and Tasmania saw the spectacular light show, which lasted about 20 seconds.
@3AW693 pic.twitter.com/VQz1f8a97G

- Matt Kearsley (@matt_kearsley) July 10, 2014
@3AW693 in Tullamarine 9.47pm pic.twitter.com/ZpRlsjXmGa

- Jan Laczynski (@YYarni) July 10, 2014
Witnessed one of the most amazing things in my life at work tonight, never thought I'd see a meteor spectacular sight #MelbourneMeteor

- Mitchell Clark (@Mitchclark18) July 10, 2014
Wow, just witnessed the amazing meteor / shooting star on way home from mums. Amazing! #melbournemeteor #melbourneshootingstar

- Lauren Clair (@lozclair) July 10, 2014
The 3AW talkback line lit up as Melburnians realised what was happening.

John told 3AW Nightline he pulled over while driving in Keilor Park to watch the light show.
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Fireball 5

Possible meteor spotted over Southern Manitoba

Brett Megarry
cjob.com
Wed, 09 Jul 2014 15:14 UTC
Fireball
© cjob.com
There are reports of a fireball streaking through the skies of Southern Manitoba.

Scott Young with the Manitoba Museum tells CJOB they got some calls from the Interlake just before 11 this morning.

"Saying, is there something going on? I saw this big trail of smoke in the sky and then we had a big explosion, but I didn't hear any sounds. What's with that?

Well we think what happened is a little asteroid or a big version of a meteor came into the atmosphere somewhere over Central Manitoba, and exploded."

Young says they can't pinpoint where it was yet, but they suspect it was in western Manitoba, so they're asking for anyone who saw it to let them know, so they can triangulate a location.
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Fireball

Scientists worry an asteroid impact will someday be mistaken for an act of war

Jason Keobler
Motherboard.vice.com
Tue, 08 Jul 2014 14:01 UTC
The graph below, titled "Known Near-Earth Asteroids," is simultaneously both terrifying and a little bit comforting. Problem is, the Y-axis on a hypothetical graph titled "Unknown Near-Earth Asteroids" would definitely extend much, much higher. Either way, we don't have a good deal of knowledge about what to do about potentially Earth-threatening asteroids, anyway.

Image
© BulletinOfTheAtomic @BulletinAtomic
That much was clear back in February of last year, when a meteor struck Chelyabinsk, Russia. The meteor came, as far as NASA and other groups that track such things are concerned, from nowhere.

The fear now is that a Chelyabinsk-sized asteroid could hit a city in a war-torn or politically tense area, which would be the powder keg necessary to throw a whole region into turmoil. It may seem like a longshot, and it may seem like something not worth worrying about, but John Remo, a Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics researcher would beg to differ. Remo just published a paper in the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists that warns that an asteroid impact could easily be seen as an act of war.

Comment: Looked at from another angle: what if, given the reality of increased cometary material in near-space and the atmosphere, the Powers That Be deliberately orchestrate wars to mask the cosmic threat? In other words, an aggressive regime might intentionally conflate a celestial object with an inter-continental ballistic missile... It's much easier to retain control so long as the little people are scared of man-made wars - incoming comets would see the powerful lose their power altogether.

The reader may enjoy Earth Changes and the Human Cosmic Connection: The Secret History of the World - Book 3 - "a ground-breaking attempt to re-connect modern science with ancient understanding that the human mind and states of collective human experience can influence cosmic and earthly phenomena."

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Fireball 5

Meteor fireball startles the population of Chihuahua, Mexico


Sott.net
Mon, 07 Jul 2014 10:15 UTC
meteoro México
© El Heraldo de Chihuahua
Last Saturday night, at 9 pm, a fireball turned the night sky into day across several towns in Chihuahua, Mexico. Eyewitnesses reported having seen the object burst into small pieces and disintegrate after having traveled for a few minutes, leaving a white, yellow, orange and green trail on its path.

In Parral, three explosions were first heard, and several calls were made to the authorities inquiring about their origin. At the same time, in San José de los Bailón, eyewitnesses stated that they had seen a fireball crossing the sky "as if if had been fireworks, except that it was travelling in a downward trajectory!".

At the time of the sighting, a primary school was celebrating a graduation, and the children and parents present gave accounts of the "magnificent light show" they had witnessed.

In yet another town, Providencia, a family observed the phenomenon. José Luis Aguirre said that "it was like a shooting star, but brighter, and we saw this extremely bright light blaze across the sky from one end to the other. It was amazing."
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Fireball 2

Fireball over in Malaga, Granada and Seville, Spain, only 4 days after two others were observed


Sott.net
Sun, 06 Jul 2014 06:06 UTC
meteorito Málaga
© Instituto de Astrofísica de AndalucíaThe last meteor recorded in Malaga, in 2005
On June 26th, social media networks were flooded with messages from excited eyewitnesses of a "meteor sighting" in the skies above Malaga, Granada and Seville. The next day, the sighting was confirmed by the Institute of Astrophysics in Andalucia: It was doubtlessly a meteor fireball. Unfortunately, no images were taken.

Mr. Ortiz, a scientist working for the observatory, said: "The curious thing about it is that 4 days previously, also in Malaga, two other consecutive fireballs had been observed, with similar characteristics and occurring only 16 minutes later than the latest one."
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Fireball

Police camera films meteor fireball over West Midlands, UK


The Telegraph, UK
Wed, 02 Jul 2014 10:56 UTC
Image
A camera fitted to a West Midlands Police car films the moment a bright meteor shoots through the night sky

Police car cameras are usually used to catch images of suspects, but in the early hours of Monday morning West Midlands Police captured a meteor fireball shooting across the sky.

The video clip was taken from a traffic car while it was travelling towards Junction 4 of the M42 at Shirley just after 3am.

The meteor is believed to have broken into pieces as it entered the Earth's atmosphere and was visible across Wales and the west of England.


Comment:


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Fireball 2

Kola fireball meteorites found in Russia

Bob King
Universe Today
Tue, 01 Jul 2014 16:22 UTC
Kola Fireball
© Asko Aikkila/Finnish Fireball NetworkAmateur astronomer and physics teacher Asko Aikkila caught this image of the Kola fireball on videotape in Kuusamo, Finland on April 19, 2014. The picture has been processed to enhance the details.
A spectacular fireball that crackled across the sky near the Russia-Finnish border on April 19th this year left more than a bright flash. A team of meteor researchers from Finland, Russia and the Czech Republic scoured the predicted impact zone and recently discovered extraterrestrial booty.
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Fireball

Comet Siding Spring clears the fence over Mars' satellite-filled outfield

Sheyna Gifford
phys.org
Mon, 30 Jun 2014 13:52 UTC
Siding Spring’s orbit
© NASA/JPL-CaltechGraphic depiction of Siding Spring’s (aka comet C/2013 A1) trajectory as it swings around the Sun in 2014. On Oct. 19, the comet will have a very close pass at Mars-just 86,000 miles (138,000 kilometers) from the planet.
Like a runner rounding third base on his way to home plate, comet Siding Spring will sprint past Mars this October while making a beeline for the Sun. Siding Spring's buzz of the red planet will afford us not only an unprecedented peek at a fresh comet, but also front-row seats for a historical look back at the ancient Solar System.

"Comets like this one, which formed long ago and remained for billions of years in the icy regions beyond Pluto, still contain the primeval building materials of our solar system in their original state," said Dr. Dennis Bodewits, lead researcher on the UMD astronomy team that used NASA's Swift satellite to estimate the comet's size and activity.

Siding-Spring is a new comet coming from an old place: the Oort cloud. The Oort Cloud, named for the astronomer who predicted its existence, is a spherical shell of icy bodies that dwell between five thousand and 100 thousand AU from the Sun. One AU is equivalent to the distance between the Sun and the Earth.

"Comets formed early in the evolution of the solar system," Bodewits told Astrobiology Magazine, "while material was accreting to form planets. When proto-planets became large enough, a population of comets was dynamically ejected into the Oort cloud, where some remain stored until today."

Comment: We have been witnessing an awful lot of asteroids and comets streaming through our solar system and some grazing the planets too, though media want us to treat each event as a independent incident. What is happening in the solar system?



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Fireball 4

Green fireball seen over UK


BBC
Mon, 30 Jun 2014 11:29 UTC
Image
© Norman Lockyer Observatory
A green fireball meteor seen over the UK has been captured on camera by an observatory in Devon.

The "bolide" meteor was seen in the West Country, Wales and the West Midlands at 03:04 BST.

The fireball is reported to have been green in colour and bright enough to cast shadows.

It was captured by two special meteor cameras at the Norman Lockyer Observatory at Sidmouth in Devon.

Elsewhere, a West Midlands Police traffic officer saw the fireball while travelling on the M42. It was filmed by the car's on-board CCTV.

An eyewitness in Cardiff described the meteor as "spectacular".

It is reported to have broken into several pieces as it entered the Earth's atmosphere.

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Fireball 3

Spain: Bright fireball seen in Toledo's skies - June 22, 2014 (VIDEO)


Sott.net
Thu, 26 Jun 2014 05:39 UTC
bola de fuego España
© Observatorio de La Hita
An asteroid fragment weighing approximately 10 kilos (22 pounds) was recorded by the SPMN meteor station at La Hita Asronomical Observatory, in Toledo, after entering the atmosphere on June 22nd, at 01:20 am. It was travelling at an average speed of 75,000 kilometers per hour (46,600 miles per hour) and disintegrated before reaching the ground.
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