[meteorite-list] Scientists Outline Meteors' Paths in Colorado/Utah

From: Martin Horejsi <martinh_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Thu Apr 22 10:06:59 2004
Message-ID: <B9CAD444.4AD2%martinh_at_isu.edu>

Huh???

> The object probably accelerated quickly in Earth's atmosphere, streaking
> faster
> than 20,000 mph by the time it was 10 or 15 miles above the surface, Murphy
> speculated. At that point, the shock wave created by such acceleration could
> have split the meteorite into many pieces, which fell to the ground or
> disintegrated.

So meteorites actually accelerate in our atmosphere rather than decelerate?


> Doug Duncan, director of the University of Colorado's Fiske Planetarium, was
> pessimistic that anyone would stumble upon a chunk of meteorite.
> "For every correct meteorite an amateur collects, there's 10 'meteorwrongs,'"
> he
> joked. "And these things typically burn at 100 miles up. They can look pretty
> close, but that's deceptive."


Wow! a 10% meteorite/wrong success rate. I've heard ASU put their rate at 1%
and I figured that was generous.

Just my early morning breakfast thoughts.

Cheers,

Martin
Received on Thu 10 Oct 2002 08:52:53 AM PDT