Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Meteorite crash in Russia

rt.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

21–30 of 311 posts

Re: Meteorite crash in Russia

#22

Post by eksith »

gph wrote: post #11

>According to unconfirmed reports, the meteorite was intercepted by an air defense unit Anyone else catch this? Is this just a bad translation and they mean to say that an air defense unit tracked the meteorite on radar? I wouldn't think any air defense system would be capable of actually intercepting a meteorite, but perhaps I'm wrong. Still doesn't seem like anything intercepted it from the videos.

A meteorite would be hypersonic when first entering the atomsphere and then supersonic the rest of the way until maybe a few hundred meters before impact. Besides that, if it's not a solid iron-nickle meteorite, it may even breakup or explode well above the surface instead of staying intact.

It's not quite like taking out a satellite in low Earth orbit in that there's plenty of information on its orbit, trajectory, tumbling characteristics, approximate mass etc... It would be very, very, very hard to intercept a meteorite without a lot of information before it even got close to Earth.

The report of a missile salvo taking it out is very suspect IMO. Without more information, it's hard to tell.

Re: Meteorite crash in Russia

#23

Post by WestCoastJustin »

achompas wrote: post #13
ics wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does everyone in Russia have a dashcam or something? It seems like every other video I see on YouTube was recorded on one, and yet I don't know of anyone in Japan or the US with one installed (parking cams don't count). It's a great idea– I would probably get one if I still had a car, but it's amazing to me just how prevalent they seem in Russia. (Elsewhere too? I don't know. I'd love it if someone could enlighten me…

Can't find the link, but Kottke (of kottke.org) posted about this a while back. Russians apparently use dash cams to deter police corruption. Edit: Sorry, it's not police--they're used to aid in car insurance claims. See below. http://kottke.org/12/12/russians-are-dashboard-cam-crazy

"Corruption is rampant in the Russian Federation, and that’s led most motorists to take matters into their own hands. It’s not uncommon for a driver to be pulled over by the notorious Russian Highway Patrol (GAI) and harassed into paying a bribe. Dash cams afford at least a little protection from baseless accusations." [1]

[1] http://www.geek.com/articles/geek-pick/why-are-there-so-many...

Re: Meteorite crash in Russia

#24

Post by apaprocki »

marshray wrote: post #16
gph wrote: post #11

>According to unconfirmed reports, the meteorite was intercepted by an air defense unit Anyone else catch this? Is this just a bad translation and they mean to say that an air defense unit tracked the meteorite on radar? I wouldn't think any air defense system would be capable of actually intercepting a meteorite, but perhaps I'm wrong. Still doesn't seem like anything intercepted it from the videos.

"BREAKING NEWS - Urals meteorite shot down by Russian air defense - military source >>"

In the comments "Next Russia Today probably will write Putin himself shot the meteorite from his hunters gun."

Re: Meteorite crash in Russia

#25

Post by thresh »

gph wrote: post #11

>According to unconfirmed reports, the meteorite was intercepted by an air defense unit Anyone else catch this? Is this just a bad translation and they mean to say that an air defense unit tracked the meteorite on radar? I wouldn't think any air defense system would be capable of actually intercepting a meteorite, but perhaps I'm wrong. Still doesn't seem like anything intercepted it from the videos.

that's BS. Even S-300 or S-400 are unable to catch such a high-speed meteorite. And we don't have anything better than those.

Re: Meteorite crash in Russia

#27

Post by jpxxx »

gph wrote: post #11

>According to unconfirmed reports, the meteorite was intercepted by an air defense unit Anyone else catch this? Is this just a bad translation and they mean to say that an air defense unit tracked the meteorite on radar? I wouldn't think any air defense system would be capable of actually intercepting a meteorite, but perhaps I'm wrong. Still doesn't seem like anything intercepted it from the videos.

Just so we're all on the same general reality, that part of the report is a profound and total lie, promulgated by a broken media system for uninteresting but undoubtedly unsavory reasons.
Post reply on HN