'Meteor' prompts Devon and Cornwall tremor reports

www.abovetopsecret.com...

Quoting myself :

My friend just called me (we both are in NJ), his mother lives in Quebec and seems that she saw/heard something over there and wants to know what it was. My friend called me because he knows I'm a member here and consider ATS a good source for this kind of stuff.

Location : Quebec.
Day : 10/10/12
Time : Between midnight and 00:10
Description : Big boom sound followed by an earthquake.

Seems like the frequency of these events increased. If the rocks become bigger, need to move to the next defcon level.

Hrmm. TPTB are watching me. I posted about meteor sonic booms on here a day ago. Now this subject is a top thread for the first time. Paranoid now thanks ATS.

reply to post by markymint


lol, really?

Second line

And a third.

I keep getting the feeling that we may experience another Tunguska-like with no warning.

Found an interesting link where you can see the output in real time (approximately 1 minute delay on the Internet). During a meteor shower this trace will be full of strike traces, but it is also surprising how many meteors are striking Earth’s atmosphere all of the time.

www.meteorscan.com...

Originally posted by Oannes
We should be seeing a uptick in meteor sightings. This planet is about to pass through the most meteor dense part of our galaxy, the glactic plane.

Or maybe it's the Orionids, the most spectacular meteor shower of the year that happens at exactly this time.

Originally posted by fiftyfifty
reply to post by Extralien

 

You're right we probably will never know. To experience such a large object entering the Earths atmosphere is rare at the best of times but so many in the space of a few weeks? Certainly interesting.

I say 'large object' because to produce a sonic boom so widespread, I doubt it was the usual pebble we would normally expect.

According to the BBC, doors were blown open at a police station in South Devon.

thisiscornwall.co.uk

Are there any experts in here that can give us an idea of how big it would have to be to blow doors open??

Car-Sized Meteor Breaks Up Over Bay Area Skies October 18, 2012 11:05 PM

sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com...


the evening before this happened at the Southern end of the California coast we saw the same size meteor at 11.38PM 17th

The brightness was incredible and the size stunning. A once in a life time experience and we got A white with no tail one evening and a Green with long tail the next!! I made a wish!!

The very next night 18th at about 8.30 PM before this happened in San F. we saw the same size and brightness a meteor that was lime green in the same location as the first, we assumed they both went into the sea.

They seemed so very close and the second one had a long tail and spit green globs off the front.

I say Yes something unusual is happening!!

The Orionid meteor shower is peaking right now. Noted for it's fireballs, it is predicted to be better than most years.
Best times , before dawn Saturday and Sunday night (20,21 Oct) , ~ 2:00 to 4:00AM.

Originally posted by charlyv
The Orionid meteor shower is peaking right now. Noted for it's fireballs, it is predicted to be better than most years.
Best times , before dawn Saturday and Sunday night (20,21 Oct) , ~ 2:00 to 4:00AM.

I've seen quite a few meteors recently standing outside, cause its pretty dark where I'm at. And some of them look pretty close and trail for a long time, but no sonic boom....? If those other two meteors caused sonic booms, shouldn't we be hearing a lot more of them?

*Just corrected myself.... I'm seeing shooting stars, not the actual fireballs.... But the question still stands.

I've got to be quick as on my phone and in a rush but a few people are mentioning the orionids which happen annually and I am well aware of. Never before as I'm aware have they produced so many large objects and so far in advance. Really don't think that they are related

here's a good site on meteors :

The Latest Worldwide Meteor/Meteorite News

lunarmeteoritehunters.blogspot.com...

I live in Torbay and heard it with a mate at work while we were up top on some scaffolding. We both looked at each other and agreed it was the strangest thunder we had ever heard.

...workmate then quipped that his ex-girlfriend lives in the direction of the sound and she must have just finished eating a big meal

Originally posted by fiftyfifty
Never before as I'm aware have they produced so many large objects and so far in advance. Really don't think that they are related

Yep, they are not related.

11. Is there a chance of a meteor from a meteor shower or storm reaching the ground as a meteorite, and is it dangerous to observe meteor storms?

The meteoroids which make up a meteor shower or storm are very fragile in nature, and are composed of a somewhat “fluffy” composite of material from which all volatile material has escaped, due to many trips near the sun. This material readily vaporizes in the upper atmosphere, and is given the descriptive name of “friable” material. While quite spectacular to watch, a meteor storm presents no real danger to the viewer, who is protected by miles of atmosphere.

Source: The American Meteor Society Meteor Shower FAQs

I can also prove that an Orionid could not have caused this event:

The radiant must be above the observer's local horizon in order for meteors from that particular shower to be visible.

Source: wikipedia

In the case of the Orionid radiant, at the time of the event in question, the radiant would have been over 15 degrees below the horizon, as you can see in the screen shot below of my planetarium software that was set to 16:15 BST on the 18th. The thicker white horizontal line represents the horizon, and I've indicated the approximate position of the radiant with a green dot.



Here's an illustration of the position of the Orionid radiant

In fact, the quote from wikipedia is slightly misleading as meteors from a meteor shower who's radiant is below the horizon can be seen, but not when it is below about15 degrees. Meteors seen belonging to a meteor shower who's radiant is below the horizon are known as "earth grazers", and they can be very impressive to see. However, due to the angle involved, an earth grazer from a radiant below the horizon, would always be traveling upwards in relation to a person observing it. So it would be physically impossible for a meteoroid to penetrate deep into the atmosphere, which it would have to in order to cause a sonic boom that could be heard on the ground.

I've tried to represent this situation with a diagram (sorry for the poor quality - I don't know how to draw straight lines with my software that are not horizontal/vertical), where "A" (in red) represents a location where the radiant will be well below the horizon for an observer at that location, and the green arrows represent the direction/trajectory of meteors.



As you can see, at the location in question, a meteoroid would be traveling upwards and out of the atmosphere, although it may have been low enough to produce sonic booms well before reaching this location, but too far to be heard at location "A".

Earth Grazing Meteors
One of the more fascinating aspects of our gently curved meteor meniscus is the fact that it will permit the viewing of meteors whose radiant is actually below the horizon of the observer. From Figure 1, it can be seen that a shower radiant which is exactly at the horizon, to either left or right, will still generate meteors which strike our meniscus horizontally, but "illuminating" only 1/2 of our observable sky. Meteors which are seen near the horizon will have some small entry angle into the atmosphere, but those meteors which occur nearly overhead will be travelling almost perfectly horizontal. These grazers can traverse unusually long paths through the atmosphere because they are skimming horizontally through less dense portions of air , rather than penetrating downward to denser layers. These meteors are quite spectacular to observe and can occasionally cover more than 100 degrees of arc for an observer below.

As the shower radiant dips below the horizon, it will, for a time, still be able to illuminate some portion of our meteor meniscus -- as long as the entry angle of the meteors into the atmosphere remains at 0 degrees or higher. This permissible region of sky shrinks as the meteor radiant drops, and the resulting meteors will occur at greater and greater distances from the observer. Finally, the shower radiant will reach a critical angle below which it can no further illuminate our observable sky, and the show will be over until the radiant once again begins to rise -- with the first possible meteors from the shower occurring when this critical angle is again reached.

Source: The American Meteor Society

Of course, this does not rule out meteoroids from other meteor showers (there are a handful of meteor showers active right now), but for the reasons I pointed out at the top of this post, they are not a likely source either.

A much more likely source is a small asteroid or asteroid fragment since asteroidal material is generally less fragile than cometary material (which is the source of most annual meteor showers), and so can penetrate deeply enough into our atmosphere to cause sonic booms that may be heard/felt on the ground.

However, there is still no evidence to suggest that the booms in question were caused by an extraterrestrial body entering the atmosphere, although it remains a distinct possibility as far as I can see.

A satellite/junk reentering the atmosphere may be a possibility, but not a very likely one since there were no reentries forecast for the time period as far as I'm aware.

I'd like to know how widely spread the sonic-boom reports were - if they were only over a small area, perhaps it was a military aircraft breaking the sound barrier. If they were spread out over a large area, then that would suggest that an object entering the atmosphere cause the booms.

Originally posted by dayve
And some of them look pretty close and trail for a long time, but no sonic boom....? If those other two meteors caused sonic booms, shouldn't we be hearing a lot more of them?

It's not uncommon for meteors (especially brighter meteors) to seem much closer than they actually are. This is because our brains are hardwired to interpret a bright object as being close rather than far. Most meteors completely vaporize before they get below 80km altitude, but even at this distance they can appear to be very bright and "big".

Due to their great brightness large meteors often create a remarkable optical illusion in which it appears that they have hit the ground somewhere nearby. The glowing fireballs we see in the night sky are caused by atmospheric pressure and friction, but meteors stop ablating (burning) approximately seven miles high. If you are lucky enough to witness a bright fireball, and the flame goes out while it's directly overhead, it is possible that the meteorite will land nearby. When we see a bright shooting star apparently landing close by, what we are usually seeing is a fireball arcing away, over the horizon, still high up in the atmosphere. Due to the curvature of the Earth, the fireball may seem to hit the ground, but has in fact just moved out of our field of view and gone beyond the horizon. Because of its extreme brightness the fireball appears — to our human eyes — to be much closer than it actually is. It's something I, myself, have been fortunate enough to witness a couple of times and it's frustrating because it does look as if the meteorite landed "just over there." However, it probably landed hundreds of miles away. Another thing to consider is that when a meteorite lands near observers, those witnesses report hearing loud sonic booms, and/or "whizzing" noises. If no sound accompanied the spectacle, then the meteor was probably a great distance away. But at least you had the privilege of witnessing a real fireball!

Source: aerolite.org

Experienced sky watchers on SeeSat-L may find it difficult to believe that anyone could misidentify a re-entry as a spaceship, but human perception is notoriously fallible, and no one is immune. Much depends on the circumstances and personal experience. Driving through the wilderness under a pitch black sky, and suddenly faced with a slowly moving formation of brilliant lights can be awe-inspiring and even terrifying. The human mind races to make sense of the unfamiliar, drawing on experience that may be inadequate. Depth perception can play tricks, such that something 200 km away, 100 km long, and moving at 7 km/s, seems to be just 200 m away, 100 m long, and moving 7 km/h - the angular velocity is roughly the same.

Seesat-l mailing list

It's actually very common for people to experience illusions like this when observing meteors or fireballs. See this thread I started on the subject last year: How good are we at estimating the distance and altitude of UFOs?

Originally posted by whatnext21
Found an interesting link where you can see the output in real time (approximately 1 minute delay on the Internet). During a meteor shower this trace will be full of strike traces, but it is also surprising how many meteors are striking Earth’s atmosphere all of the time.

www.meteorscan.com...

I've been watching that link you found for some time now and the screen has been blank the whole time. Still nothing at all. Is meteor scan down ? I still have nothing and it always has some kind of an image to share ?

Guess it only works at night.

This is my first post here on ATS. This thread made me create an account so that I could reply. After reading most of the posts I have to say that Nibiru, or Wormwood, or whatever you want to call it, I just think its our Sun's binary twin with orbiting planets perhaps. Anyways, this "twin" is coming back around like it has many times before. And with this system comes debris. Which is what we are getting pelted with more and more lately. Honestly, this "theory" is the only explanation that makes the most sense. We have ancient civilisations talking about it in many different ways. The "winged circle" from Egyptian carvings for example. It answers the question about the asteroid belt and why it is there. About how Mars may have lost its atmosphere. The weird weather, volcanic activity, earthquakes, etc. All can be attributed to our Sun's twin getting closer to us. Seriously, do you really think our Sun is one of the very few suns in our galaxy to be singular? I can't buy that. It has a twin just like the rest of them and its time for that twin to hit the reset button on our planet. Its funny how such a logical theory is laughed at. Just how "they" want you to react.

Originally posted by FireballStorm

Originally posted by dayve
And some of them look pretty close and trail for a long time, but no sonic boom....? If those other two meteors caused sonic booms, shouldn't we be hearing a lot more of them?

It's not uncommon for meteors (especially brighter meteors) to seem much closer than they actually are. This is because our brains are hardwired to interpret a bright object as being close rather than far. Most meteors completely vaporize before they get below 80km altitude, but even at this distance they can appear to be very bright and "big".

Due to their great brightness large meteors often create a remarkable optical illusion in which it appears that they have hit the ground somewhere nearby. The glowing fireballs we see in the night sky are caused by atmospheric pressure and friction, but meteors stop ablating (burning) approximately seven miles high. If you are lucky enough to witness a bright fireball, and the flame goes out while it's directly overhead, it is possible that the meteorite will land nearby. When we see a bright shooting star apparently landing close by, what we are usually seeing is a fireball arcing away, over the horizon, still high up in the atmosphere. Due to the curvature of the Earth, the fireball may seem to hit the ground, but has in fact just moved out of our field of view and gone beyond the horizon. Because of its extreme brightness the fireball appears — to our human eyes — to be much closer than it actually is. It's something I, myself, have been fortunate enough to witness a couple of times and it's frustrating because it does look as if the meteorite landed "just over there." However, it probably landed hundreds of miles away. Another thing to consider is that when a meteorite lands near observers, those witnesses report hearing loud sonic booms, and/or "whizzing" noises. If no sound accompanied the spectacle, then the meteor was probably a great distance away. But at least you had the privilege of witnessing a real fireball!

Source: aerolite.org

Experienced sky watchers on SeeSat-L may find it difficult to believe that anyone could misidentify a re-entry as a spaceship, but human perception is notoriously fallible, and no one is immune. Much depends on the circumstances and personal experience. Driving through the wilderness under a pitch black sky, and suddenly faced with a slowly moving formation of brilliant lights can be awe-inspiring and even terrifying. The human mind races to make sense of the unfamiliar, drawing on experience that may be inadequate. Depth perception can play tricks, such that something 200 km away, 100 km long, and moving at 7 km/s, seems to be just 200 m away, 100 m long, and moving 7 km/h - the angular velocity is roughly the same.

Seesat-l mailing list

It's actually very common for people to experience illusions like this when observing meteors or fireballs. See this thread I started on the subject last year: How good are we at estimating the distance and altitude of UFOs?

That sounds about right thanks for clearing that up..

www.spaceweather.com...

This is the website which I'm sure many of you are aware of. It gives Solar activity information and forecasts on possible M-Class or X-Class flares and coronal mass ejections. At the bottom of the page there are asteroids whose location size and proximity are all recorded. They specify when these asteroids will pass by the earth.

Now these are solid predictions for astronomers. None of the recent meteors were predicted as asteroids in advance. Now perhaps they are very small but... meteors and asteroids produce big radar traces apparently. So it should be possible to track them?

The site states that the meteorite that made landfall in the San Francisco bay area (which they haven't found) was not part of the: "Note: This was not an Orionid." That doesn't mean that it wasn't a meteorite, it means that they weren't expecting it and didn't see it coming in. The one in Cornwall was nearer to the time so less is known but if the sonic boom was strong enough to blast open the doors of a police station then it must have been pretty big. If you call it an asteroid then why wasn't it spotted and predicted.

Nibiru and the second sun. Well one is a planet and the other is a sun. Zacharia Sitchens books seem to indicate that it's still out there and has another 1500 years before it arrives (by my reckoning). A brown dwarf as the earth companion star is a good one but we haven't spotted it. Although the green house effect is more likely to be caused by something external to the earth (with man made stuff contributing) and although that could be a brown dwarf, I would suggest the outer planets would heat up first and to a greater extent. It's hard to deny that the most likely cause of global warming if it affects all the planets, will be the sun. It now seems that conduction of plasma to the earths core and some magnetic bottle effect, may be to blame.

The situation is more complex than it seems. Probably the big secret the science has revealed but refuses to talk about, is that the Big Bang exploded faster than light. An explosion in time which has two dimensions leads to two universes not one. One cast into the past with a prevalence for particles, one cast into the future with a prevalence for waves, with light bouncing back and forth between the two. Descending from the singularity (outside of time) you have them folded by 60 to 90 degrees and partially interpenetrating thus we have suns and stars as the visible presence of the wave universe. Being folded in this way gives us a triangle of light thus a basic illuminati symbol.

The winged disk represents the combination of Gravity and Lifeforce at a 90 degree angle. The two emerge from the winged disk which itself is an energy at right angles to light. The analogy is the magnetism and electricity that descend from light. Thus lifeforce being related to gravity enables human levitation to the annoyance of our scientists. It does not represent Nibirru.

Originally posted by ShaunS
Now these are solid predictions for astronomers. None of the recent meteors were predicted as asteroids in advance. Now perhaps they are very small but... meteors and asteroids produce big radar traces apparently. So it should be possible to track them?

The site states that the meteorite that made landfall in the San Francisco bay area (which they haven't found) was not part of the: "Note: This was not an Orionid." That doesn't mean that it wasn't a meteorite, it means that they weren't expecting it and didn't see it coming in. The one in Cornwall was nearer to the time so less is known but if the sonic boom was strong enough to blast open the doors of a police station then it must have been pretty big. If you call it an asteroid then why wasn't it spotted and predicted.

Meteors (generally caused by quite small meteoroids - dust sized to sand gran sized although some are occasionally a bit larger) are easy to see using radio detection when they are in the process of entering the atmosphere since they ionize the air around them, which is what reflects the signal back to the detector so that the meteor is detected. Outside of the atmosphere, there is no (or very little) ionization, so they can not be detected.

Radar can detect larger objects (asteroids) outside the atmosphere, but they must be passing by and quite close.

The type of object that causes booms when it enters the atmosphere, is not necessarily very big (in relative terms). An asteroid fragment 1 - 2 m wide can penetrate deeply enough in the atmosphere for booms to be heard on the ground.

Since most monitoring for asteroids is done visually (telescopes), small (a few meter diameter) asteroids are difficult to see out in space unless they are very close since they don't reflect much light. Further away, they are too dim to detect.

The technology is getting better, but you can't expect every small object to be spotted before hand.

So far only a single object in this size range has been detected prior to "impact" (like most small asteroids that hit the atmosphere, it disintegrated many Km above the ground). Asteroid 2008 TC3 as it was called was detected a day or two before impact, and was around the size of a mid-sized car before it entered the atmosphere and exploded above Sudan in 2008.

Here's a photo showing one of the fragments of 2008 TC3 that was recovered from the desert:
[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/df52760fdd30.jpg[/atsimg]

reply to post by FireballStorm

Hey FireballStorm. Glad I caught your entries. Have you recorded any Orionids? Let us know.

And have you had a chance to analyze any of this?

Meteor over SF Bay Area