Fire in the SkyS


Meteor

US: Daytime fireball roughly a 5-ton meteor, NASA estimates

Peter Mucha
philly.com
Tue, 15 Feb 2011 19:55 UTC
Early Monday afternoon, a bright object flashed across the sky before vanishing with a flash, according to scores of eyewitnesses from Virginia to Massachusetts.

The likeliest explanation is that a large meteor - a space rock hurtling through the atmosphere - passed eastward over the North Jersey-New York City area.

Image
© MIKE HANKEY / www.mikesastrophotos.com
It might have been 5 feet in diameter with a weight of more 5 metric tons, judging from reports that it blazed as bright as a full moon, said NASA scientist Bill Cooke of the Marshall Space Flight Center.

He based his estimate on "a reasonable speed" of 33,500 m.p.h. Good thing it didn't hit anything.

"My crude estimate of the energy of this fireball is about 100 tons of TNT, which means it was capable of producing a crater 125 feet in diameter and about 15 feet deep, assuming an impact into sandstone," Cooke said.
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Question

Plane crash alert may have been meteorite strike


York Press
Tue, 15 Feb 2011 08:45 UTC
A meteorite strike may have led to emergency services receiving reports of a plane crash in the early hours today.

Fire crews from Selby, Tadcaster and West Yorkshire were called to the Whitley Bridge area at about 12.20am as they investigated reports an aircraft may have come down in the area.

However, the six teams did not find any aircraft which had crashed, and North Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Service said a meteorite strike was possibly the reason for the alert.
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Meteor

SOTT Focus: Comet Elenin: Harbinger of What?

Laura Knight-Jadczyk
Postcards From the Edge of Reality...
Tue, 15 Feb 2011 08:48 UTC
We had a chat with the Cassiopaeans the other night and got in a few questions about Comet Elenin, to wit:
Q: (Andromeda) Is the outburst of asteroid 596 Scheila related at all to Comet Elenin?

A: Yes. And other bodies. See McCanney.

Q: (Andromeda) So what caused that asteroid to become a comet?

A: It became electrified!
In case you don't know, 596 Scheila is an asteroid that suddenly began behaving like a comet this past December. See HERE for some nice images.

596 Scheila
© Peter Lake(596) Scheila, the asteroid with a tail.
As I've mentioned before, James McCanney's Plasma Theory of Comets is quite interesting and deserves some consideration. I understand from a few people who have written to me about it that McCanney isn't the only one approaching the problem from this direction: there is also Wallace Thornhill and David Talbot, but I haven't yet had time to explore what they are saying.

Anyway, in respect of the above remarks by the Cassiopaeans regarding McCanney's theories vis-à-vis 596 Schiela, my astronomer friend made the following comment to me in a private communication:
The activity of Scheila started roughly at the same time as the storm on Saturn. Can it be because of an alignment Saturn-Elenin-a few belt asteroids-Scheila?
He included a graphic showing the alignment:

Alignment
© Sott.netImage showing alignment of Saturn, Comet Elenin, and Scheila.
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Meteor

Strange Aerial Phenomenon Over Mendocino California


Partybeforewealldie
Tue, 15 Feb 2011 09:59 UTC
First video - no zoom


Second video - with enlargement

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Meteor

Russian astronomers predict Apophis-Earth collision in 2036


RIA Novosti
Wed, 26 Jan 2011 15:27 UTC
Image
© NASA PL-Caltech/TRussian astronomers predict Apophis-Earth collision in 2036
Russian astronomers have predicted that asteroid Apophis may strike Earth on April 13, 2036.

"Apophis will approach Earth at a distance of 37,000-38,000 kilometers on April 13, 2029. Its likely collision with Earth may occur on April 13, 2036," Professor Leonid Sokolov of the St. Petersburg State University said.

The scientist said, however, the chance of a collision in 2036 was extremely slim saying that the asteroid would likely disintegrate into smaller parts and smaller collisions with Earth could occur in the following years.

"Our task is to consider various alternatives and develop scenarios and plans of action depending on the results of further observations of Apophis," Sokolov said.
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Meteor

US: Possible Meteorite Spotted Over Philly


MyFoxPhilly
Mon, 14 Feb 2011 12:17 UTC
Fox 29 has received several reports of an object that resembled a meteor that has spotted in the sky near the Philadelphia Navy Yard facility.

The incident happened before 12:45 p.m. ET, according to witnesses who called Fox 29. There are also reports on Twitter and Facebook about the incident.

Fox 29 TV reporter Chris O'Connell also saw the object, which he described as "majestic" and "beautiful," at about 12:35 p.m. as he was driving on I-95 near the airport.

A Fox 29 viewer spotted the object at 12:36 p.m. in Delaware.

There also have been several reports of similar occurrences today in Connecticut and New York.
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Sun

Sun launches Earth-directed solar flare


Spaceweather.com
Mon, 14 Feb 2011 03:11 UTC
On Feb. 13th at 1738 UT, sunspot 1158 unleashed the strongest solar flare of the year so far, an M6.6-category blast. NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory recorded an intense flash of extreme ultraviolet radiation, circled below:

Image
© NASA/SDO
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Question

Frost Quakes or Overhead Explosions? Ohio, US: Mysterious Loud Explosions Explained


WHIO TV
Thu, 10 Feb 2011 14:19 UTC
Click here to watch the video.

Officials at the Darke County EMA have identified what caused loud, explosion-type sounds that shook homes early Thursday morning.

The EMA said it has investigated reports from Central Indiana to Western Ohio about the sounds. They said they have worked with several agencies and departments and have determined that the loud sounds were caused by a phenomena called Cryoseism, also known as Frost Quakes.

Temperatures plunged below zero in the early-morning hours and the booms may have been caused by rapid differential expansion of warm buildings on the inside and very cold air on the outside.
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Meteor

Bizarre fireball filmed over Germany

NYC812
YouTube
Fri, 11 Feb 2011 08:21 UTC
Image
© NYC812
Comment: This looks like it could be a fireball/comet fragment that is doing some electrical things as described by Jim McCanney. Also, looks like some of the strange comet things described by the ancients and why they called comets "serpents." The double tail then appears to be just the way this one manifested.

Also, some fireballs that travel so "leisurely" may be not be purely 'physical' objects since electrical phenomena also seem to be often transdensity (or transdimensional).

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Meteor

Asteroid makes sharpest turn yet seen in solar system

Jeff Hecht
New Scientist
Wed, 09 Feb 2011 00:00 UTC
2001CQ1
© NASA
On Friday, a metre-sized asteroid called 2011 CQ1 was spotted zipping only 5480 kilometres above the Earth's surface. That is the closest near miss on record, beating the previous record holder, a rock that buzzed Earth in 2004 called 2004 FU162, by a few hundred kilometres.

When something that small comes close to our planet, Earth's gravity is sure to bend its orbit. In this case, the approach was so close that the little asteroid's path bent by 60 degrees, reports Don Yeomans of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.

Short of collisions with a planet, that's the biggest orbital change ever recorded by observers. It was large enough to shift the asteroid from one category of objects into another. As Yeomans and his JPL colleague Paul Chodas explain in an online update:
Prior to the Earth close approach, this object was in a so-called Apollo-class orbit that was mostly outside the Earth's orbit. Following the close approach, the Earth's gravitational attraction modified the object's orbit to an Aten-class orbit where the asteroid spends almost all of its time inside the Earth's orbit.
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