Hi Robert, Sterling, Erik, Greg, Darren, ALL, Thanks for all the answers...
I wanted to include a photo in my question. We're all familiar with Mike
Hankey's now world famous PA fireball photo which just happened to catch
the fragmentation of a large meteoroid as it was breaking up. This left
many smoke trains in the air from each fragment.Now, even though no
meteorites have yet to be recovered from this, there is a possibility
there will be. But it brings up a question. This was an abnormal
fireball and rather large but I've included another photo of a smaller
Leonid meteor, with what appears to be a small smoke train emerging from
the incandescence and entering dark flight.
Take a look at this Leonid photo. As you can see after the incandescence
there's a small smoke train shooting out from the tip of the meteor. Is
that in fact the smoke train from the particle/meteoroid just before
entering dark flight? Or was this just the last bit of the meteoroid
burning up?
Leonid: http://www.meteoritesusa.com/images/Leonid_Meteor-wikipedia-cc.jpg
Leonid Closeup:
http://www.meteoritesusa.com/images/Leonid_Meteor-wikipedia-cc-2.jpg
Regards,
Eric
From: Meteorites USA<e...@meteoritesusa.com>
Subject: [meteorite-list] Dumb Questions About Meteors& Meteorites
To: "Meteorite-list"<meteorite-list@meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Monday, January 25, 2010, 9:26 PM
Hi Everyone,
I'm not too sure how to broach the subject without stepping
on toes, so I say this will all due respect to everyone who
would be offended by the questions.
I've been reading "Meteorites" by Caroline Smith, Sara
Russell, and Gretchen Benedix, Firefly Books, 2009. Lovely
book, with lots of information on meteorites, their origins,
and composition, with loads of illustrations and great
photography.
As I was flipping through I found a mention about the total
weight of meteoritic material which falls on our planet
every year. On page 89 it states "...approximately
40,000-60,000 t of extraterrestrial material lands on Earth
every year, the majority of which is in the form of tiny
dust grains usually less than 1 mm (1/25 in) in size;
importantly, most of this dust is believed to originate from
comets..."
Doesn't this go against what science tells us about meteor
showers? Don't the particles and sand-grain sized particles
burn up in the atmosphere like science tells us they do? And
if they don't burn up completely why does just about every
text on meteors say they do? And if that the case, then how
is it possible to weigh something that doesn't exist,
anymore?
I've read this in other places as well, some sources say
that there is thousands of tons to millions of tons of
meteoritic material landing on Earth every year. Yet...
We all "know" that small dust to sand grain sized particles
burn up high in the atmosphere, and there is debate on what
it takes, or rather how large meteoroids must be to reach
the ground and become meteorites. We know Asteroid
2008 TC3 was small but much larger than dust. So if a 3-6
meter asteroid can hit Earth, how small of a piece of debris
can make it to Earth through the atmosphere? How big was
Whetstone Mountain before entering our atmosphere? There was
not much of that piece recovered, and the video showed 3
distinct fragments flying briefly through the field of view
of the camera. West Texas was a daylight fireball seen from
hundreds of miles away, and it produced a good bit of
material. Buzzard Coulee too. These recent meteorite falls
have been hunted by a large number of very professional
meteorite hunters and scientists and yet the TKW of the
falls are small except maybe the BC fall. Buzzard Coulee had
a HUGE 13 kilo piece
http://www.skyriver.ca/astro/bruce/marsden_meteorite%205.JPG
that impacted the ground and hundreds of other smaller
stones recovered.
So how big "does" a meteoroid have to be to reach the
ground? Do we really know?
Regards,
Eric Wichman
Meteorites USA
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