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

271–280 of 311 posts

Re: Meteorite crash in Russia

#271

Post by madaxe »

lutorm wrote: post #265
JPKab wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can someone please enlighten me, because I was under the impression that there is no ABM system on the planet capable of intercepting, let alone destroying, a large rock moving at 10km/second. I'm not saying its impossible, but it just seems to me that there is a lot of misinformation as to what actually happened.

I'm with you here. The RIM-161 standard anti-ballistic missile used by the US is quoted by wikipedia as having a speed of 9600km/h or 2.7km/s. Speeds in low-Earth orbit are about 7-8 km/s, objects entering from a solar orbit likely several times that. There is absolutely no way you would have significant success probability of intercepting it with a missile unless you knew the incoming orbit very precisely. Just look…

Gazelle does at least 5.5km/s.

Re: Meteorite crash in Russia

#272

Post by madaxe »

tobiasu wrote: post #262
InclinedPlane wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you certain? This would be news to the world. For reference, here's what an ABM transporter looks like: http://www.ausairpower.net/PVO-S/53T6-SH-08-Gazelle-ABM-TL-1... Or this: http://www.ausairpower.net/PVO-S/Gorgon-ABM-Transporter-Load... Here's what a portable ICBM looks like: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/00/Moscow_Pa... Or this: http://www.fas.org/programs/ssp/nukes/images/rs24tel.jpg

That's not news :) The reason these things are extremely off-road capable is so they can move around in the woods and the enemy can't take them out in a first strike attack. The retaliation capability is what creates the (desired) balance between nuclear powers. Same with nuclear submarines. Hide and seek for "grown-ups"...

Don't forget "passenger trains". Neatly dressed up to look like the express service, but chock full o' nuclear goodness. The roof peels back, and you can launch straight from the rails.

Re: Meteorite crash in Russia

#273

Post by nzonbi »

andrewfelix wrote: post #90
creamyhorror wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here's a great dashcam video that captures the meteor arcing across its field of vision and lighting up the scene more brightly than the sun like a nuclear blast (first submitted to HN by dennisgorelik). I almost thought it was a hoax, and even tried to examine the video for signs that it was CGI. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tJOJ6B2XOyA The guy doesn't even say anything for a long while, just starts speeding up. e…

That is surreal. My jaw dropped as it came into perspective. Looks like it came straight out of Hollywood.

Absolutely sublime video. So many things about our world mixing in. I suggest complimenting it with the full tune, that plays in the background: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DN87dn1ZPhw

Re: Meteorite crash in Russia

#274

Post by _kst_ »

ovi256 wrote: post #227
DanBC wrote: post #221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I predict the ABM interception will turn out not to have occurred. I agree. > We don't have a surveillance system capable of detecting something that size until it hits atmosphere, NASA tracks at least 21,000 items above 10 cm diameter. Objects above 3 mm can be tracked by ground based radar. ( http://orbitaldebris.jsc.nasa.gov/faqs.html#3 ) ( http://orbitaldebris.jsc.nasa.gov/ )

Almost all the items NASA tracks have orbits inside the solar system. This thing came out of nowhere (if it's orbiting around the Sun, it's so excentric that the orbit period is very long so it's like we saw it for the first time - if it's not orbiting the Sun, we did see it for the first time).

What's your basis for asserting that it has (well, had) a particularly eccentric orbit?

Re: Meteorite crash in Russia

#275

Post by geoka9 »

mmastrac wrote: post #31

Here's a collection of insane videos of the event, some with the enormous sonic boom: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XIAm5hq8WWc http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b0cRHsApzt8 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Np_mpGYSBSA Can anyone translate what they are saying in the first one? You can get a good idea of the new videos being posted using YouTube's "last hour" filter: http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=%D0%BC%D0%…

> Can anyone translate what they are saying in the first one?

You probably don't want to know. Lots of cussing :)

He actually has no idea what's going on. At one point he jokes about artillery strikes and then starts calming down his friends ("Don't be afraid, nothing's happened yet.")

Then he urges his friends to go grab their jackets (apparently they ran out to the street without them). While running, he exclaims "now, that's some serious shit!" and then urges his friends to be calm once more.

"The most interesting stuff is about to begin."

The guard at the entrance tells them they can't come in to take their jackets.

"That thing flew by, there was a flash and it crashed in the woods."

"What an adventure!"

"It entered the atmosphere and started burning. The remaining stuff then crashed."

"I thought a war's underway."

"Don't cower. But I didn't get what the explosions were about."

"The windows are all smashed."

"I love it!!!"

....

It must be some kind of college. The kids must be students.

Re: Meteorite crash in Russia

#276

Post by Zancarius »

ChuckMcM wrote: post #256
madaxe wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If it is true, they've been lobbing nukes - their principal ABM for ICBMs/fast re-entry is the Gazelle - 10kt warhead.

And looking at the flash, and the effects (or not) that it had on the solid state imagers, I think we can rule out a nuclear intercept. My reasoning is that a 10kT nuclear detonation @ 20km would toast any unprotected CCD or CMOS image element looking at it.

I assume there would have also been a detectable gamma burst that Western satellites would've picked up if they're trained on the region.

Re: Meteorite crash in Russia

#277

Post by jlgreco »

madaxe wrote: post #269
pm90 wrote: post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We're talking about the same guys who absolutely definitely positively did not use nukes to build shipping canals Ok, I'm genuinely not sure whether you're being sarcastic. So _did_ the Russians use nukes to build shipping canals?

They experimented with it, publicly declared it a success, but said they weren't going to do it, and proceeded to use the tech on the far side of the country. Pechora-Kama I think was the original project. Maybe they did, maybe they didn't, but the locals I've met (Kazakhstan) insist that they did.

Didn't the US experiment with it as well?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Plowshare

It wouldn't surprise me if the Russians were looking at the same thing, but it should leave some fairly telling clues behind. At the very least you can see plowshare craters littering Nevada on google maps (in a nice grid pattern in some areas, just search for "Sedan crater" and zoom out a little), I would expect similar to be somewhere in Russia if they were doing the same.

Edit: This is the Russian version of plowshare: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_Explosions_for_the_Nati... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chagan_(nuclear_test)

Re: Meteorite crash in Russia

#278

Post by lutorm »

madaxe wrote: post #271
lutorm wrote: post #265

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm with you here. The RIM-161 standard anti-ballistic missile used by the US is quoted by wikipedia as having a speed of 9600km/h or 2.7km/s. Speeds in low-Earth orbit are about 7-8 km/s, objects entering from a solar orbit likely several times that. There is absolutely no way you would have significant success probability of intercepting it with a missile unless you knew the incoming orbit very precisely. Just look…

Gazelle does at least 5.5km/s.

But how long does it take to get to that speed?

Re: Meteorite crash in Russia

#279

Post by lutorm »

madaxe wrote: post #214
jcarreiro wrote: post #206

Earlier quoted context omitted.

According to the article, "Servicemembers from the tank brigade that found the crater have confirmed that background radiation levels at the site are normal", and "Background radiation levels in Chelyabinsk remain unchanged, the Emergency Ministry reported". I am no physicist. But assuming that we can take these reports at face value, doesn't that rule out the possibility that the meteorite was intercepted by a nucle…

Not really. A 10kt yield at altitude wouldn't leave much radioactivity above background at ground level. Also, this is the Russian military we're talking about. I don't think they'll fess up to detonating a nuke, no matter how small, in a populated area. We're talking about the same guys who absolutely definitely positively did not use nukes to build shipping canals. Oh, and I am a Physicist. MSc from an Ivy-League e…

A 10kt yield at altitude wouldn't leave a crater, either...

Unless it was used to blow up a large chunk of rock which then proceeded to fall to the ground. In that case, you'd get a crater, but you'd also get the radioactive material.

Re: Meteorite crash in Russia

#280

Post by lutorm »

venus wrote: post #111
andrewfelix wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do you suppose there would be two contrails?

I wouldn't think they are contrails. One would expect them to mainly be smoke and dust from the disintegration/combustion/ablation during the descent.

By definition, they aren't "contrails". A "condensation trail" can only happen when something like an internal combustion engine injects water (or another compound that will condense) into the air.
Post reply on HN