Posted on 02/17/2013 11:18:37 PM PST by SunkenCiv
Explanation: What in heaven's blazes is that? Thousands of people living near the Ural Mountains in Russia saw last Friday morning one of the more spectacular meteors of modern times streak across the sky. Forceful sound waves arrived at the ground minutes later, knocking people over and breaking windows for hundreds of kilometers. The above video is a compilation of several car dashcams and includes real time footage of the meteor rampaging, smoke trails drifting, shadows quickly shifting, and even the meteor's light reflecting off the back of a bus. The fireball is thought to have been caused by a car-sized chunk of ice and rock crashing into the Earth's atmosphere. Since the event was captured from so many angles, the meteor's trajectory has become determined well enough to indicate from where it came and to where any resultant pieces might have landed. It is already certain that this meteor had nothing to do with the several-times larger asteroid 2012 DA14 which passed the Earth from a different direction later the same day. If pieces of the meteor are found, they might tell humanity more about the early Solar System, when the meteor was likely formed.
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[Credit & Copyright: RussiaToday]
What in heaven's blazes is that? Thousands of people living near the Ural Mountains in Russia saw last Friday morning one of the more spectacular meteors of modern times streak across the sky. Forceful sound waves arrived at the ground minutes later, knocking people over and breaking windows for hundreds of kilometers. The above video is a compilation of several car dashcams and includes real time footage of the meteor rampaging, smoke trails drifting, shadows quickly shifting, and even the meteor's light reflecting off the back of a bus. The fireball is thought to have been caused by a car-sized chunk of ice and rock crashing into the Earth's atmosphere. Since the event was captured from so many angles, the meteor's trajectory has become determined well enough to indicate from where it came and to where any resultant pieces might have landed. It is already certain that this meteor had nothing to do with the several-times larger asteroid 2012 DA14 which passed the Earth from a different direction later the same day. If pieces of the meteor are found, they might tell humanity more about the early Solar System, when the meteor was likely formed.
A cosmic shot past Earth’s ear. Spectacular. And deadly. If that were to have hit in downtown Kiev,or Moscow or anywhere like that, forget about it! One of these day’s though, sooner or later there will be one that will make this one look like a spitball.
The crater outside Winslow Arizona is about 3/4 of a mile wide and was caused by an asteroid about 50 yards in diameter. If that were to occur over a large city like New York, there would be nothing left alive.
Darn tooting. Most folks go about their daily lives with no clue as to what goes on above us in the heavens and that’s probably a good thing. My wife and I are amateur astronomists.(very amateur) I have a 6-inch refractor scope . The Atlantic Ocean is about eight miles due east of my backyard so there’s always a lot to see and almost no light pollution. Anyway, tell most folks that in July 1994 we all down here on Earth got the chance to see what could have happened to us if things like deflection, angle, velocity, gravity and sheer chance stacked up against us and a big hunk of rock the size of Mt. Everest, Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 had plowed into us. It would have been THE END. Not like some of the planet would have survived or anything like that, nope, that would have been IT, curtains. But the odds didn’t stack up against us that time, thank God. And also the fact that our big cosmic ‘’shortstop, the planet Jupiter is out there pulling in stuff that would normally come smashing into us. Hasn’t always worked and might not some day but so far Ol’ Jupiter has been doing a pretty good job. I’ve told folks that sometimes and I swear to God I’ve seen the color drain out of some peoples faces when I’ve told them this. It’s a good thing not to tell most people this. I mean, bad enough we’re going to get it someday but imagine what five and a half billion bat-poop crazy humans would do if they knew they all had anywhere from a few months to maybe just a few weeks to live?
This Russian one was about 50 feet across, the near-miss asteroid was 150 yards across — hence the latter was about three times the size in three dimensions, or about 27 times as massive.
If the Russian one was iron-nickel it would have been many times worse.
Thanks for the post.
Anyone know if this meteor explosion caused an electromagnetic pulse? I read that cell phones were knocked out.
Jupiter, the cosmic short-stop, I love it!
Okay! I see you got the “spectacular” right there! Great post, Sir!
Had the meteor come in at a steeper angle it might gave hit and left a crater.
gave = have
my work apparently blocks the NASA picture of the day, odd.
Is there any truth to the story that Russian radar missed it coming in?
Holy Crap! Is God mad at us?
Thanks pal ................................................................................ FRegards
That is very interesting. Russian radar is not very good.
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