NASA’s All Sky Fireball Network

[Azt]

“What was that bright light in the sky last night?”

Interesting to say the least.

http://fireballs.ndc.nasa.gov


The network currently consists of 12 cameras, 6 of which are placed in locations in north Alabama, north Georgia, southern Tennessee, and southern North Carolina. 4 are in the northern Ohio/Pennsylvania area, and the remaining 2 are located in southern New Mexico. The network is growing all the time, with plans to place a total of 15 cameras in schools, science centers, and planetaria in the United States, predominantly east of the Mississippi River, where there are few such systems.

[MorningSong]

Yep... I saw that spaceweather.com has added that to their site:


SCROLL DOWN FOR FIREBALLS: There's something new on Spaceweather.com. Scroll down the page and look for the "All Sky Fireball Network." Every night (even during a government shutdown) NASA scans the skies for meteoritic fireballs. Every morning, we'll be presenting their results from the night before. The data include orbits, velocity, penetration depth in Earth's atmosphere and more.


All Sky Fireball Network
NEW: Every night, a network of NASA all-sky cameras scans the skies above the United States for fireballs--that is, meteors brighter than Venus. Automated software maintained by NASA's Meteoroid Environment Office calculates their orbits, velocity, penetration depth in Earth's atmosphere and many other characteristics. Daily results are presented here on Spaceweather.com.

On Oct. 14, 2013, the network detected 7 fireballs.
(4 sporadics, 1 Orionid, 1 epsilon Geminid, and 1 southern Taurid)

http://spaceweather.com/images2013/14oct13/orbits_strip.gif

In this diagram of the inner solar system, all of the fireball orbits intersect at a single point--Earth. The orbits are color-coded by velocity, from slow (red) to fast (blue).

[Hervé]

Yep... I saw that spaceweather.com has added that to their site:


...

In this diagram of the inner solar system, all of the fireball orbits intersect at a single point--Earth. The orbits are color-coded by velocity, from slow (red) to fast (blue).

Of course they all intersect at Earth's location... that's where they all have been recorded! (i.e. not on Mars or Venus).

[Bill Ryan]

Yep... I saw that spaceweather.com has added that to their site:


...

In this diagram of the inner solar system, all of the fireball orbits intersect at a single point--Earth. The orbits are color-coded by velocity, from slow (red) to fast (blue).

Of course they all intersect at Earth's location... that's where they all have been recorded! (i.e. not on Mars or Venus).

A geeky technical note: the 'orbits' will have been extrapolated (back-calculated) from the best estimate of speed and angle of atmospheric entry. It's not like they've been tracked for years. :)

We've been taken by surprise by all of them. The very notion they they HAVE been orbiting the sun is an extrapolation, also.

[MorningSong]

Yep... I saw that spaceweather.com has added that to their site:


...

In this diagram of the inner solar system, all of the fireball orbits intersect at a single point--Earth. The orbits are color-coded by velocity, from slow (red) to fast (blue).

Of course they all intersect at Earth's location... that's where they all have been recorded! (i.e. not on Mars or Venus).

AHAHAHAH...that's pretty much a no-brainer, isn't it... funny!

Good to see ya back, Amzer Zo!