The most common metallic meteors are iron-nickel, so green is a common color. This glow tends to be brightest when meteors hit the atmosphere at high speed.
Do meteors ever hit the atmosphere at low speed?
Fireball Spotted over Northeastern USA
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Re: Fireball Spotted over Northeastern USA
#32Are we having lately many more meteor sightings than "before", or is it just that we have better tools/more cameras to spot it?
I saw a bright green huge one in Portland, Oregon USA in the 2004-2006 time period. Only tool I had was my eyes and brain to recall it (and I can still recall it well).
I told a few people about it and moved on. I’m guessing that’s the most common response.
Re: Fireball Spotted over Northeastern USA
#33In case the link won't load for anyone else, there's a YouTube video on the page: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RfNdaYqVxR0
Damn YouTube is pushing the ads these days. I don't remember last time I opened YouTube and didn't see an ad on open. I'm logged into Chrome, no VPN or funny business. What a racket.
Try uBlock oirign my friend.
Re: Fireball Spotted over Northeastern USA
#34Maybe those UFOs we shot down weren't just weather balloons from amateur clubs...... Good thing I've been playing a lot of XCOM recently. On a more serious note is it possible this is another "Oh my god" particle event ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oh-My-God_particle )
I suspect that even at that energy level we'd not be able to see a single particle way high up in the atmosphere. But I'm no physicist so who knows.
You're right.
Even if we could see it, it'd be more of an impossibly-brief flash of light that dumps all of its energy in one place.
It wouldn't be a weird fireball that moves across the sky.
Re: Fireball Spotted over Northeastern USA
#35This is your annual reminder to have a real DR plan in case us-east-1 goes away. Partly kidding, but also, y'know, when I see "fireball over northeast US" my mind jumps there.
Re: Fireball Spotted over Northeastern USA
#36I think I saw one of these during a meteor shower, ten years ago, in Georgia. It was so fast, and so unexpected, that I question my own recollection of it. When I tell people I saw a fireball, they shrug. They don't know how it's different from a shooting star. But in my memory it looks like a smoky fireball, and I had the impression that it was particularly close to the earth.
I had an experience a bit like that, but with mini-tornadoes, somewhere along the M11 in the UK (Essex I think, but perhaps the edge of Cambs). I recall looking it up afterwards and it seemed to be 'a thing', though none of the news examples I found from various years before the event were anything like as extreme - tens and tens of them, well-formed. A truly bizarre 'what is happening' experience for me - before tha…
"the UK gets an average of 30-50 tornadoes a year. That’s more tornadoes per land area than anywhere else in the world (except – weirdly – the Netherlands.)"
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/3QTh1mRGDNg16cDYHg...
I too would've said we never get them here, apart from remembering one big one in the news I think in or near Birmingham...
Re: Fireball Spotted over Northeastern USA
#37Re: Fireball Spotted over Northeastern USA
#38Re: Fireball Spotted over Northeastern USA
#39I think I saw one of these during a meteor shower, ten years ago, in Georgia. It was so fast, and so unexpected, that I question my own recollection of it. When I tell people I saw a fireball, they shrug. They don't know how it's different from a shooting star. But in my memory it looks like a smoky fireball, and I had the impression that it was particularly close to the earth.
I saw one maybe 10 years ago, I was outside at night and noticed it get bright. Looked up and there it was, or the last bit of its streak was. They aren't that rare apparently, but the big ones like in this video are rare: https://www.amsmeteors.org/fireballs/faqf/#2
Re: Fireball Spotted over Northeastern USA
#40Can anyone estimate its speed just from that video?