I did some quick googling and found this interesting research from Oberlin, with a history of meteorite injuries and deaths: 1420 BC Israel - Fatal meteorite impact. 588 AD China - 10 deaths; siege towers destroyed. 1321-68 China - People & animals killed; homes ruined. 1369 Ho-t'ao China - Soldier injured; fire. 02/03/1490 Shansi, China - 10,000 deaths. 09/14/1511 Cremona, Italy - Monk, birds, & sheep killed. 1633-6…
Norwegian skydiver nearly struck by meteorite
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Re: Norwegian skydiver nearly struck by meteorite
#62Shouldn't we be expecting a rock that has just been heated to plasma stage by atmospheric friction only seconds earlier to be glowing, steaming or leaving little molten fragments of itself behind? Update: maybe not. The last stage of flight is "dark and cold" according to this: http://www.meteorite-recon.com/en/Meteorite_fusion_crust_1.h...
Re: Norwegian skydiver nearly struck by meteorite
#63I did some quick googling and found this interesting research from Oberlin, with a history of meteorite injuries and deaths: 1420 BC Israel - Fatal meteorite impact. 588 AD China - 10 deaths; siege towers destroyed. 1321-68 China - People & animals killed; homes ruined. 1369 Ho-t'ao China - Soldier injured; fire. 02/03/1490 Shansi, China - 10,000 deaths. 09/14/1511 Cremona, Italy - Monk, birds, & sheep killed. 1633-6…
It does seem strange that there are ten 19th century events and eight in the 20th century. Not so much because the numbers are different, but because there was twice the population, and literacy and communication were so vastly improved.
Re: Norwegian skydiver nearly struck by meteorite
#64Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yeah, Occam's razor tells me that it's much more likely that a stone got stuck somewhere in their skydiving apparatus than having a meteorite fly right past you while you're skydiving. Maybe I'm underestimating the quantity of meteorites falling on the earth but since the newspapers aren't exactly filled with news of people getting killed by falling rocks I'm not yet ready to believe that was a meteorite.
He explains in the video why it's not possible to have been from the aircraft or other flyers.
Re: Norwegian skydiver nearly struck by meteorite
#65Seems strange that the other diver is following the same path as the meteorite and passes by just a few seconds later. Could he have dropped it and it accelerated to a speed faster than he was travelling?
Possibly. A small rock would have a lot less air resistance than a person, and those suits are designed to increase air resistance. So it might end up with a higher terminal velocity and fall slightly faster. http://www.wired.com/2013/10/do-heavier-objects-really-fall-... http://www.physicsclassroom.com/mmedia/newtlaws/efar.cfm
This is a bit more complicated than it appears at first glance. Other things being equal, a 3D object's mass increases as the cube of a single dimension's increase, but its surface area increases only as the square. Therefore a smaller object's atmospheric terminal velocity can be expected to less than that for a large one. This is why many kinds of small animals can fall great distances through the atmosphere and land unharmed.
(Until objects approach terminal velocity, they all fall with the same profile. Only when approaching terminal velocity do their speeds change.)
On the other hand, a typical rock (non-metallic) has 3.5 times the density of a human, so that argues in favor of a greater terminal velocity.
A full analysis would need to take into account the human's flight suit, which turns vertical kinetic energy into horizontal kinetic energy, and the rock's size, shape and composition.
But without any of this and a priori, the idea of a rock flying past a human, as in the video, is perfectly reasonable.
One more thing. The picture of the rock passing by the human is actually most likely a person flying horizontally past a rock that's dropping vertically.
Re: Norwegian skydiver nearly struck by meteorite
#66A related question: what's the probability of an aircraft being struck by a meteor. Seems this question was asked in the wake of the Air France flight 447 disappearance (since resolved as pitot tube freezing combined with pilot error and control feedback failures of the Airbus design). But still, the odds of a strike on _an_ aircraft over the next 20 years are about 4%: http://blog.revolutionanalytics.com/2009/06/how…
That would be under an assumption that the distribution of planes around the globe is even. Given most jetliners are flying in corridors, I would say the actual probability is much much lower. The same can be probably said about meteorites - I guess their geographic distribution is uneven as well.
Re: Norwegian skydiver nearly struck by meteorite
#67I did some quick googling and found this interesting research from Oberlin, with a history of meteorite injuries and deaths: 1420 BC Israel - Fatal meteorite impact. 588 AD China - 10 deaths; siege towers destroyed. 1321-68 China - People & animals killed; homes ruined. 1369 Ho-t'ao China - Soldier injured; fire. 02/03/1490 Shansi, China - 10,000 deaths. 09/14/1511 Cremona, Italy - Monk, birds, & sheep killed. 1633-6…
The data are interesting on their own if you start with the idea that meteor strikes are random across centuries, but the information collection and preservation isn't. For instance, with two data points you might claim there were more monks than princes in Renaissance Italy, but they were both surrounded by literate people who kept records compared to the even more numerous peasants. However, I suppose interpreting…
Re: Norwegian skydiver nearly struck by meteorite
#68I'm... skeptical. If you look at the frames of the meteorite falling, it looks like each frame has the fragment at about 3 feet from its last position. If that's a 60fps camera (I think it is?), that's 180 f/s speed or 122mph. That seems really slow for a rock flying into the atmosphere from space, and far slower than a rock would have to be going for it to "cut him in half." My guess: a rock that fell off the underc…
The camera appears to be recording at a rate of about 10 frames per second. This is a way to reduce memory consumption in a portable device in which recording duration has a higher priority than recording frame rate.
AT 10 FPS, the rock's sequential positions seem consistent with a falling rock.
And, lo and behold:
http://gopro.com/cameras/hd-hero3-silver-edition
Quote: "Features video resolutions up to 1080p60, 10MP photos up to 10 frames per second, enhanced low-light performance and built-in Wi-Fi. Waterproof to 131’/40m."
According to the above, ten frames per second is the highest available frame rate.
> Or a particularly slow meteorite.
Not a meteorite until it gets to the ground.
Re: Norwegian skydiver nearly struck by meteorite
#69I'm... skeptical. If you look at the frames of the meteorite falling, it looks like each frame has the fragment at about 3 feet from its last position. If that's a 60fps camera (I think it is?), that's 180 f/s speed or 122mph. That seems really slow for a rock flying into the atmosphere from space, and far slower than a rock would have to be going for it to "cut him in half." My guess: a rock that fell off the underc…
Camera isn't stationary.
Re: Norwegian skydiver nearly struck by meteorite
#70I'm... skeptical. If you look at the frames of the meteorite falling, it looks like each frame has the fragment at about 3 feet from its last position. If that's a 60fps camera (I think it is?), that's 180 f/s speed or 122mph. That seems really slow for a rock flying into the atmosphere from space, and far slower than a rock would have to be going for it to "cut him in half." My guess: a rock that fell off the underc…
> If that's a 60fps camera (I think it is?) ... The camera appears to be recording at a rate of about 10 frames per second. This is a way to reduce memory consumption in a portable device in which recording duration has a higher priority than recording frame rate. AT 10 FPS, the rock's sequential positions seem consistent with a falling rock. And, lo and behold: http://gopro.com/cameras/hd-hero3-silver-edition Quote:…