Fireballs
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Fireball 3

Meteor fireball 'tore up the skies' in northeast Brazil

Brazil fireball
© High News
Piauí, Ceará and Pernambuco, Brasil 26NOV2016
20-30 Second Duration with Sonics Reported


On the night of that last Saturday (26) a big meteor tore up the skies of Ceará and Piauí. It could be seen, in addition to these two states, by Maranhão, Pernambuco, Paraíba, Rio Grande do Norte and Bahia.

Unfortunately, none of the cameras monitoring of BRAMON recorded the event, but we managed to collect around 40 reports in several cities close to what has happened and from these reports, we set up a trajectory estimated for the object, which can be seen in this map.

Meteor in Brazil trajectory map
© 2016 BramonSightings Map of 26NOV2016 Brasil Bolide.
The object began to shine on the ocean, next to the city of Fortaleza, and crossed the Ceará from north to south, passing near Crateús, where we received several reports. Entered the state of Piaui and went about the city of peaks.

There are reports that it was beyond the state of Piauí, toward the Bahia, but even if I don't have to come to both, the juggernaut presents pretty impressive numbers:
- lasted something between 20 and 30 seconds.
- travelled over 600 miles in the atmosphere.
- had a speed between 20 and 30 km / sec.
Until this moment, is very low the possibility that this is a re-entry of space junk, but still have not ruled out the possibility. The more likely it is that in the case of a meteor buzz, also called earthgrazer.

Comment: One of the reports made by a resident in the city of Hidrolândia said the fireball had an orange, yellow tone and was followed by noise similar to thunder.


Question

Two large flashes light up night skies over Surgut, Western Siberia

Flashes over Surgut, Western Siberia
© YouTube/Igor Kessler
This video uploaded to YouTube shows two overhead flashes in Surgut, Western Siberia on 22nd November 2016. The description indicates a thunder-like crackling sound was also heard. Was this lightning or another type of electrical discharge? Or perhaps overhead meteor explosions?


Comment: Earlier this year unexplained flashes of light puzzled residents of Petrozavodsk, Russia.


Fireball

House in Indonesia hit by meteorite

A house hit by an alleged meteor
© Tempo.coA house hit by an alleged meteor.
Residents of Sungai Serut District, Bengkulu City, were surprised by a rock that is alleged to be a meteor that ripped through a house owned by Wahab (56), on Wednesday, November 24, 2016.

At the time of the incident, according to Wahab, he was having a casual conversation with his friend. Suddenly, they heard a loud thump from the inside of his house. The noise originated from his kitchen.

After a quick search, Wahab found a rounded smoky object that is as big as a basketball that had made it through his kitchen roof. "Not only did it hit the roof, the rock also destroyed the water dispenser and a water gallon, as well as a table," he said.

Wahab and a number of his friends flushed the rock with water and placed it outside the house. The locals broke the white-colored rock to pieces and gave it to a number of people as they believe that the meteorite has a certain effect.

The rest of the rock has been handed over to the police.

Fireball 2

Meteor fireball observed over Ireland and northern UK

meteor fireball over Ireland and UK
© Google Maps/IMO (screen capture)
A fireball was spotted streaking its way through the skies over the UK and Ireland last night.

People reported seeing the meteor from Swansea all the way to Moray.

The only known visual evidence of the fireball was recorded by a web cam in Galway, Ireland, at around 5.15pm as it blazed its way overhead.

The fireball was spotted by people in Belfast, Galway, Dundee, Glasgow, Ayrshire, Skipton, Cumbria, Swansea, Merseyside, Alnwick and York.

And it wasn't long before people took to social media to share their sightings.

Amateur astronomer Brian MacGabhann, from Galway, captured the only known footage on a dash-cam in his car.

He shared the footage on Facebook and said he spotted the meteor in the North East from where he was in Galway.


Comment: The International Meteor Organization (IMO) has received over 80 reports about a fireball seen over England, County Mayo, Wales, Northern Ireland, Nord-Pas-de-Calais Picardie, Scotland, Gelderland, County Galway, Zeeland, Vlaanderen, County Kilkenny, Limburg and Wallonie on Wednesday, November 23rd 2016 around 17:20 UT.

NASA space data supports citizens' observations that - meteor fireball activity is increasing dramatically!

statistics meteorites fireball
© AMS



Fireball 2

Bright meteor fireball reported over the Gulf of Mexico near Florida; residents feared 'alien invasion' after seeing bright flash

Florida meteor fireball Nov 21 2016
© Youtube/North Port, Florida (screen capture)
Reports of a bright flash in the Western sky out over the Gulf of Mexico late Monday night.

At around 11:18 P.M. on Monday there was a bright light that lit up the night over the Suncoast.

We have had numerous reports of this "fireball" moving toward the west out over the Gulf of Mexico.

Josh Stone ABC 7 meteorologist saw it out his window and said "Never seen anything like that before,.....looked as bright as the sun....heard a little rumbling after it faded away".

Getting numerous reports of the fireball from North Port to Bradenton about this bright light in the sky.


Comment: The American Meteor Society (AMS) has received over 140 reports about a fireball seen over FL, GA and AL on Tuesday, November 22nd 2016 around 04:17 UT. Residents on Florida's Western coast even alerted authorities over concerns that an alien invasion was underway.

Florida Meteor Video

Reminder :
statistics meteorites fireball
© AMS



Fireball 3

Japanese teenager films meteor shortly after Fukushima earthquake

Meteor over Japan
© Asuka/Twitter
A teenager has filmed a ' meteorite ' burning across the sky shortly after the Japanese earthquake struck.

The teen, known as Asuka, 16, from Japan, filmed the extraordinary sight trailing across the evening sky this evening.

A rough translation of her Tweet accompanying the video says: "A movie I took while preparing to die.

"Thought that it was a meteorite because there was an earthquake earlier. It is not a meteorite."

The video emerged as the country absorbed the 7.3 magnitude earthquake that has shaken Tokyo after striking off the coast of Japan.

Chalkboard

Mathematician claims one in 500 chance of extinction next year

Earth
© NASAThe calculation is based on the Doomsday Argument.
The human race faces a one in 500 chance of extinction in the next year, an expert mathematician has claimed.

Dr Fergus Simpson, a mathematician at the University of Barcelona's Institute of Cosmos Sciences, said there was a 0.2 per cent chance of a "global catastrophe" occurring in any given year over the course of the 21st Century.

The calculation is based on the Doomsday Argument, which it is claimed can predict the number of future members of the human species given an estimate of the total number of humans born so far.

"Our key conclusion is that the annual risk of global catastrophe currently exceeds 0.2 per cent," Dr Simpson wrote in an academic paper called Apocalypse Now? Reviving the Doomsday Argument, accessed through Cornell University's online library.

"In a year when Leicester City FC were crowned Premier League champions, we are reminded that events of this rarity can prove challenging to anticipate, yet they should not be ignored," he added.

According to Dr Simpson's calculations, around 100 billion people have already been born and a similar number will be born in the future before the human race expires.

He estimated there was a 13 per cent chance humanity would fail to see out the 21st Century.

This is a more optimistic conclusion than previous studies, with British Astronomer Royal Sir Martin Rees suggesting there was a 50 per cent probability of human extinction by the year 2100 in his 2003 book Our Final Hour.

Fireball 2

Meteorite from October fireball found in Morawa, Western Australia

Professor Phil Bland with the 1.7kg meteorite he found in Lake Eyre on January 1.
© Curtin UniversityProfessor Phil Bland with the 1.7kg meteorite he found in Lake Eyre on January 1.
Curtin University researchers have retrieved a meteorite from a paddock in Morawa.

The 1.15kg space rock fell to earth on Halloween night, around 8pm on October 31.

Thanks to information from the public through the Fireballs in the Sky app, and images captured by four Desert Fireball Network cameras Curtin's team was quickly alerted to the situation and Professor Phil Bland and Dr Martin Tower drove out to the area to begin knocking on doors.

By Sunday November 6 a full search team was scanning the projected fall area, and by Monday morning they had recovered the object.

Fireball

Two meteor fireballs captured twenty hours apart on November 15 over Spain

Supermoon fireball
© Screenshot via YouTube/Meteors
Very bright fireball over the South of Spain on 15 Nov. at 2:55 UT (3: 55 local time). It belongs to the Southern Taurids meteor shower.

The event took place during the Super Moon and was produced by a fragment from Comet 2P/Encke that hit the atmosphere at about 110.000 km/h. The bolide began at a height of about 108 km over the province of Granada and ended at an altitude of 60 km over the south of the province of Jaen.


Fireball recorded on 15 Nov. 2016 at 22:55 UT (23:55 local time) from Calar Alto Observatory (Spain). According to the preliminary analysis of this event, it would be a Southern Taurid fireball that overflew the North of Africa, produced by a meteoroid from Comet 2P/Encke.


Question

Sonic boom over South Dakota remains a mystery

Leonid Meteor
© Wikimedia CommonsA meteor during the peak of the 2009 Leonid Meteor Shower. The photograph shows the meteor, afterglow, and wake as distinct components.
Spearfish — The mystery of what caused Monday's loud boom remains.

Some theories have been refuted, while more mysterious references have appeared.

Shortly before 2 p.m., the boom was heard throughout the Black Hills. Some people said it shook their homes or businesses, rattling windows, and scaring them in several instances.

But the noise was heard in a much larger area than the Black Hills. Responses to Tuesday's Black Hills Pioneer story reported hearing the noise from Western Nebraska to Southeast Montana.

Kathy Griesse reported hearing the noise near the Agate Fossil Beds National Monument south of Harrison, Neb. She said it sounded like the noise came from the north and west of her. Additionally, she talked to people in Crawford, Neb., where people told her windows rattled at the sound of the boom; people in Whitney, Neb., also heard the noise.

On the northern end of reports, Lane Pilster said he heard the boom at his ranch, 14 miles west of Alzada, Mont.

This is about a 200-mile straight-line distance between the two reported locations.

Pilster reported that he and his dad both heard the noise to the south of them.

"The beginning of it was intense, but then faded off with a dull rumbling like a jet was flying by. The sound probably lasted about 8-10 seconds," Pilster said.

He also said he felt a moderate vibration around 5:30 a.m. Monday, and that it lasted 15-20 seconds.

He wasn't the only one to hear a strange noise apart from the 2 p.m. event.

Brad Scott, of Spearfish, heard a loud boom in downtown Spearfish around 7:30 a.m. Sunday

He described it as the "sound of about 8 shotguns going off at once."

So what was the noise?