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Southern hemisphere recovered quicker from devastating asteroid strike

Asteroid Strike
© Pic about Space
Researchers from the US and Argentina have analysed fossilised leaves and presented a new theory as to why the southern hemisphere recovered faster following the asteroid strike that killed the dinosaurs 66 million years ago.

Ecosystems in North America took 9 million years to recover from the asteroid, whilst in South America, insect life bounced back only after about 4 million years. This is the conclusion of the join US-Argentine research team that has published the results of its study in the journal Nature Ecology & Evolution.

Previous evidence had suggested that the asteroid strike - which killed all non-avian dinosaurs and a large number of other species - had a less severe impact on the southern hemisphere and one theory had argued that this was because it provided a sort of refuge for species. However, this new research points to a different explanation, being that ecosystems recovered much more quickly than in the north.

'This extinction is very important - it is one of the major extinctions in the history of the Earth,' commented lead researcher Michael Donovan of Pennsylvania State University. 'The biodiversity patterns we see today, where things are living, may be related to what survived - so it is important to learn about what was happening around the world at this time.'

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Comets & asteroids summary for October 2016

NEA's Discovered
© Remanzacco Blogspot
During the months of October 2016, 3 new comets were discovered. "Current comet magnitudes" & "Daily updated asteroid flybys" pages are available at the top of this blog (or just click on the underline text here).

The dates below refer to the date of issuance of CBET (Central Bureau Electronic Telegram) which reported the official news & designations.

Comet Discoveries


Oct 11 Discovery of C/2016 T1 (MATHENY)
Oct 13 Discovery of C/2016 T2 (MATHENY)
Oct 18 Discovery of C/2016 T3 (PANSTARRS)

Other news

Oct 14 Klim Ivanovich Churyumov (1937 - 2016), astronomer and co-discoverer (with Svetlana Gerasimenko) of comet #67P passed away on October 14, 2016

Oct 17 The third-largest object known beyond Neptune, 2007 OR10, has a moon. The discovery was reported in a poster by Gábor Marton, Csaba Kiss, and Thomas Mueller presented at the joint meeting of the European Planetary Science Congress and the Division for Planetary Sciences of the American Astronomical Society (DPS/EPSC) in Pasadena, California. The Hubble Space Telescope took the photo below of 2007 OR10 on September 18, 2010. Later analysis of the images revealed the presence of a moon (red circle).
2007 OR10 with Moon
© NASA/STScI/Wesley Fraser/Gábor Marton et al.

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Fireball spotted in the sky over Nova Scotia

Fireball
© CTV News, CanadaCorinne Reid saw something quite spectacular in the evening sky yesterday! What was it?
Yesterday, at precisely 4:40pm, flames raced towards earth over Dominion Cape Breton. Luckily for us, Corinne Reid had a camera handy and snapped some amazing photos. She posted them on my Facebook page.

At first glance, I thought it might be a fireball; after all, this is the time for the annual Taurid Meteor shower; the peak occurs this Friday. And to add to the intrigues, a viewer reported a bright light streaming across the sky near Port Felix, at the same time the day the before!

Over the next little while, more information trickled in. Corinne tells us that the "event" lasted about 10 minutes; time enough for her to get her camera. She zoomed in with the 200X digital zoom on her camera.

The post and photos got some very interesting comments from experts in various fields. A member of an Observatory club in Toronto said it was an aircraft.

Locally, Jeff Dalton weighed in and added that it could very well have been space junk, entering our atmosphere.

Michael Boschat at the Halifax Centre of the Royal Astronomical Society Canada says " 100% definitely a short aircraft contrail image. " He says that even seasoned observers occasionally have a difficult time differentiating them from fireballs.

That does make sense: we're seeing a ball of fire because the jet is moving away from the observer. It's all about the angle of the jet in in sky in relation to the photographer.

Jeff Dalton made a good point and it's something I say a lot too: "Whatever it may be, or was, it is a neat sight. I keep telling people to keep an eye on the sky because there are all kinds of things to see above, day and night! This is yet another example".

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Bright meteor fireball observed over North Dakota and Minnesota

meteor fireball over North Dakota and Minnesota
© Google/AMS (screen capture)
An unusual sighting for many people Sunday night, reports of a huge flash in the sky about 6 p.m. It has many people wondering what they saw and how typical this is.

"It will be bright so it will catch your eye if you are looking the right way," said MSUM Astronomy Professor Juan Cabanela.

Hundreds of people commented on the Valley News Live Facebook page about a huge fireball in the sky.

"I would count myself lucky in the sense that is a really cool thing to see," stated Cabanela.

A report from Red Lake, Minnesota said "I was in the woods with some friends and we seen a bright white light, lit up everything in the woods."

Another from Grafton North, Dakota, "I seen a huge flash and nothing else. It was unexplainable."

"Fireballs are fairly rare, they are the biggest of the meteors and so they also tend to be sporadic and not necessarily always associated with a meteor shower," explained Cabanela.

A map from the American Meteor Society, a place that tracks meteor sightings, shows that 67 people reported this fireball. The sightings were reported mainly in North Dakota and Minnesota but also in South Dakota and Manitoba, Canada.

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This 1492 Ensisheim 'thunderstone' impact was interpreted as an omen from god

Thunderstone of Ensisheim
© Schedel, Hartmann/Wolgemut, Michael/Pleydenwurff, Wilhelm: Liber chronicarum, NürnbergIllustration depicting the “thunderstone” at Ensisheim.
Only a few weeks after Christopher Columbus reached the New World in October 1492, another foreign explorer—this time an errant space rock—touched down on firm ground following its own protracted journey across an inhospitable expanse.

This extraterrestrial visitor came to be known the Ensisheim meteorite, named for the Alsatian town adjacent to the wheat field where it impacted on the morning of November 7, 1492 (according to the Julian calendar). It is the oldest meteorite impact with a confirmed date on record, and has become famous for its dramatic fall from the heavens, an event that was witnessed by onlookers and recorded for posterity by writers like the Italian priest Sigismondo Tizio.

"At this point there has to be mention of the immense portent which was seen this year in Germany: for on the seventh day of November [1492], near the city of Ensisheim and the village of Bauenheim above Basel, a great stone fell out of the sky, triangular in shape, charred, the color of metallic ore, and accompanied by crashing thunder and lightning," Tizio said in his History of the Sienese. "When it had fallen to earth it split into several pieces, for it had traveled at an oblique angle; to the amazement of all, indeed, it flattened the earth when it struck."

A young boy is said to have found the impact site first, attracting a crowd of awed spectators. In an age when comets, shooting stars, and other celestial phenomenon remained unexplained, the appearance of the meteorite was quickly attributed to divine intervention.

Naturally, everyone wanted a chunk of the rock that God had deemed fit to chuck at Earth. Any superstitious reservations they might have had about the "thunderstone" or "firestone" as some took to calling it, did not prevent them from breaking off pieces to take home as souvenirs. Some slices were also saved to be sent to dignitaries, like Cardinal Piccolomini, who later became Pope Pius III.

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Meteor fireball seen over Perth, Western Australia

Fireball
© So PerthGreen fireball, somewhat similar to what was described over Perth tonight, over South American nations Argentina, Brazil and Uruguay in 2015.
A huge ball of fire was seen streaking over Perth. People across Perth have seen a huge ball of fireball over the city tonight. Some people even said they heard explosions like fireworks in the moments afterward.

Perthites took to social media to report seeing the huge fireball streak across the sky, just after 7pm Wednesday evening.

At the time a crescent moon could be seem to the west-south-west and the first evening stars were visible, just after the sun sank.

People quickly reported on Twitter and Facebook that they had seen a fireball, that lasted around 30-seconds, and even heard explosions in the moments afterward.

JBE on Twitter wrote, "Gorgeous streaking green light in Swanbourne!"

"It was spectacular - bright green. I thought it was a flare at first," Katjo said.

People from Mandurah, Mt Pleasant, Perth's coastal suburbs all said they said the bright lights. Others said they heard loud booms around that time.

"I thought I heard like 3 fireworks going off," said Rob.

It's possible the fireball was connected to the South Taurid meteor shower, which peaks every year around late October and early November.

The award winning Perth Fireballs in the Sky app is the place to go to report sightings.

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Evening meteor fireball lights up skies from Ontario to Massachusetts

East coast fireball heatmap
© AMS MeteorsHeatmap of witness location and first estimated trajectory.

More than 160 reports


The AMS has received over 160 reports so far about of a fireball event over seen over Pennsylvania on November 1st, 2016 around 08:15pm EDT (Nov. 2nd ~ 00:15 UT). The fireball was seen primarily from Pennsylvania but witnesses from Maryland, New York, Connecticut, Ohio, Virginia, West Virginia, Michigan, Massachusetts, Delaware and Ontario (Canada) also reported the event.

Trajectory

Below is the map of the witnesses location with the first estimated trajectory. The preliminary estimated trajectory plotted from the witness reports shows the meteor was traveling from the North East to the South West and ended its flight near the Pine Creek Valley.

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Multiple people across northeast U.S. report seeing fireball Tuesday night

Fireball - stock image
Stock image
The American Meteor Society says they received more than 160 reports of a fireball sighting on Tuesday night.

Primarily seen in Pennsylvania, the fireball was also spotted over a number of northeastern states, including New York. Many people in Buffalo said they saw it.

The sightings occurred around 8:15 p.m.

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Meteor fireball streaks across northern Japan (VIDEOS)

Fireball streaks across northern Japan
Fireball streaks across northern Japan
People in northern Japan saw a rare fireball streak across the sky early Monday.

A Nippon TV weather camera captured video of the fireball. The fiery, greenish object shot across the sky for 15 seconds before vanishing to the northeast.

One astronomer said the object was likely a brighter-than-typical meteor, which is technically called a fireball. The astronomer speculated that it could have been caused by space debris such as a satellite fragment burning up as it entered the atmosphere.



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Meteor fireball filmed over Cordoba, Spain (VIDEO)

Fireball over Spain
Slow cometary fireball on Oct. 26 (at 23:57 UT)

This fireball was observed over the South of Spain on Oct. 26, at 23:57 UT (1:57 local time on Oct. 27).

The event was produced by a sporadic cometary meteoroid that hit the atmosphere at about 94000 km/h.

The fireball began at a height of 90 km over the province of Cordoba and ended at a height of 40 km over the Mediterranean Sea.