[jimtorr]

Large craft like the space shuttle and the Concorde produce double sonic booms caused by bow shock and wake shock.

I recall that we wanted to mute some of the wild speculation that was going on, though I don't recall much of the intensity that you describe.

I noted the above, because a few weeks ago I was talking with an actual "rocket scientist" who works for the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Lab at the Goddard Space Flight Center in Laurel, Maryland.

Anyway, he didn't know about the double sonic booms, as noted above, and was speculating about debris based on reports of the double booms. He also didn't know about the strange behavior that plasma sometimes exhibits on re-entry.

This is why

[Joe Hadenuf]

I recall that we wanted to mute some of the wild speculation that was going on, though I don't recall much of the intensity that you describe.

There was a few different threads where things got slightly heated over speculation on where the spacecraft started experiencing trouble, and actually breaking up.

In any event, I personally, after hearing the reports from several in California, including the people in the SF and Bishop area, noted at the time that they sounded extremely credible when I first heard the radio reports of their observations. I knew, they were not just not your average garden varity witnesses.