[meteorite-list] 50 Years Ago: Green Fireball Over Michigan

From: Sterling K. Webb <kelly_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Tue Sep 6 21:21:37 2005
Message-ID: <431E407A.942B17EB_at_bhil.com>

Hi,

    Probably the reason for reporting on a
"green fireball" is that there were a rash of
"green fireball" sightings in the early 1950's,
both from the ground and from the air, by
pilots of commercial and military planes.
    This was during the first five years of the
"flying saucer" epidemic (started 1947), and
there was great confusion as to whether the
"green fireballs" were meteors or saucers!
    The famous Dr. Lincoln La Paz was put
in charge of a project to track and photograph
them, shortly before his death. The cameras
he helped develop were the ancestors of the
huge tracking scopes of the next decades,
however.
    The numbers of "green fireballs" were great,
much more than the normal incidence of fireballs.
They were particularly concentrated in the South
West US (Arizona and New Mexico). The rash
of "green fireballs" lasted about 2-3 years.
    They were of long duration and appeared to
follow almost horizontal paths. This suggests
slow speeds and shallow-angle entries. The
question of what they were, if indeed they were
anything except normal meteors, was never
resolved.
    Early books about "flying saucers" by Kehoe
and others who broached the idea that they were
real, physical, non-mystical spacecraft scouting
the Earth, often have whole chapters about
the "green fireballs."
    The "green fireballs" are probably more
interesting than the so-called "saucers." The
green color is not unknown, but the frequency
and path characteristics of the "green fireballs"
are unusual.


Sterling K. Webb
------------------------------------------------------------
Ron Baalke wrote:

> http://www.battlecreekenquirer.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050905/LIFESTYLE08/509050310/1032
>
> Out of Our Past
> Battle Creek Enquirer
> September 5, 2005
>
> [snip]
>
> 50 years ago today, 1955: The Air Defense Filter Center in Grand
> Rapids identified a flying object as a meteorite. The brilliant
> green fireball streaking through the sky at about 9:15 p.m.
> prompted calls to police from all around southwest Michigan,
> including Battle Creek. The meteorite was believed to have
> plunged into Lake Michigan.
>
> [snip]
> ______________________________________________
> Meteorite-list mailing list
> Meteorite-list_at_meteoritecentral.com
> http://six.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/meteorite-list
Received on Tue 06 Sep 2005 09:20:58 PM PDT