Marshall Space Flight Center Meteoroid Environment Office – Page 2

Fireball Seen Over Tennessee and North Carolina

We observed a fireball the morning of May 4 around 12:50am EDT, traveling southwest at about 77,000 mph over the Nantahala National Forest on the Tennessee/North Carolina state line. At its brightest point, it rivaled the full moon. According to Dr. Bill Cooke in NASA’s Meteoroid Environment Office at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala. , “The fireball was bright enough to be seen through clouds, which is an attention getter. In Chickamauga, Ga., one would have thought it was a flash of lightning lighting up the clouds beneath.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=teIZcESrNBQ[/embedyt]

Bright Fireball Detected by 6 NASA All Sky Cameras

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We have received numerous reports concerning a bright fireball that occurred over Georgia at 5:33:55 PM CST (6:33:55 PM EST). All 6 NASA all sky meteor cameras in the Southeast picked up the meteor at an altitude of 50 miles above the town of Georgia (SE of Atlanta). From its brightness, it is estimated that this piece of an asteroid weighed at least 150 pounds and was over 16 inches in diameter. It entered the atmosphere at a steep angle and moved almost due south at a speed of 29,000 miles per hour. The NASA cameras tracked it to an altitude of 17 miles above the town of Locust Grove, where it had slowed to a speed of 9000 miles per hour, at which point the meteor ceased producing light by burning up. It is possible that fragments of this object survived to reach the ground as meteorites.

A more detailed analysis will be performed tomorrow and further details will follow if this analysis still indicates the possibility of a meteorite fall.

Ground track, still images from the cameras, and a movie from the NASA camera located in Cartersville, Georgia attached.

Five Fun Facts for the 2015 Geminid Meteor Shower

#1. The Geminid meteor shower can be seen from both the Northern and Southern hemispheres. Because they are pieces of an asteroid, Geminid meteoroids can penetrate deeper into Earth’s atmosphere than most other meteor showers, creating beautiful long arcs viewable for 1-2 seconds. Click the image to view a Geminid in action.

Marshall Space Flight Center will host a live Tweet Chat from 10 p.m. Dec. 13, until 2 a.m. on Dec. 14. Meteor experts Dr. Bill Cooke, Danielle Moser and Rhiannon Blaauw, all from NASA’s Meteoroid Environment Office, located at Marshall, will stay up late answering questions via Twitter. NASA followers interested in joining the online conversation can tweet their meteor questions to the Marshall Twitter account, @NASA_Marshall, or simply tag their tweets with #askNASA.

#2. Geminids are pieces of debris from an object called 3200 Phaethon. It was long thought to be an asteroid, but is now classified as an extinct comet.

Phaethon’s eccentric orbit around the sun brings it well inside the orbit of Mercury every 1.4 years. Traveling this close to the sun blasts Phaethon with solar heat that may boil jets of dust into the Geminid stream. Of all the debris streams earth passes through each year, the Geminid shower is the most massive. When we add up the amount of dust in this stream, it outweighs other streams by factors of 5 to 500. Click the image to view a Geminid in action.

#3. Because they are usually bright, many people say Geminid meteors show color. In addition to glowing white, they have been described as appearing yellow, green, or blue.

Geminid meteoroids hit earth’s atmosphere traveling 78,000 mph or 35 km/s. That may sound fast, but it is actually somewhat slow compared to other meteor showers.

#4. Geminids are named because the meteors seem to radiate from the constellation of Gemini. The shower lasts a couple of weeks, with meteors typically seen Dec. 4-17, peaking near Dec 13-14. Click the image to view a Geminid in action.

#5. The Geminids started out as a relatively weak meteor shower when first discovered in the early 19th century. Over time, it has grown into the strongest annual shower, with theoretical rates above 120 meteors per hour.

Fireball Seen in Early Evening Sky on Veterans Day

On November 11 at 5:41:17 PM CST there was a fireball detected on two NASA cameras; one located at Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama and the other in Tullahoma, TN.

Last evening’s fireball was just across the Tennessee/Arkansas border over the town of Jonesboro, Arkansas (NW of Memphis – see ground track image below). Speed was about 43,000 mph, and the object weighed around 10 pounds (6 inches in diameter).

The orbit, which extends well beyond Mars, indicates that the meteoroid is a piece of an asteroid.

The Taurid Swarm is Upon Us!

Every year from September-November, the Earth passes through a broad stream of debris left by Comet Encke. The dust associated with the comet hits the Earth’s atmosphere at 65,000 mph and burns up, creating the Taurid meteor shower. Most years the shower is weak, and only a few Taurid meteors can be seen each night. Other years, the Taurids can put on a show.

This year, the Taurids may be more active than usual.

Bright Taurid fireballs may be more numerous this year, according to some scientists. Known as the Taurid “swarm,” these bright meteors are created when the Earth runs into a group of pebble-sized fragments from the comet that then burn up in the atmosphere.

“The annual Taurid meteor shower is going on right now, and we are seeing steady activity in our meteor cameras,” said Bill Cooke, lead for the NASA Meteoroid Environments Office. “Individuals should not be surprised if they see a bright meteor or fireball over the next few nights.”

Taurid meteors can be seen any time the constellation Taurus is above the horizon during the months of September, October, and November. The best time to look for Taurids is after midnight, when Taurus is high in the sky, and when the sky is dark and clear, with no moonlight to mask the fainter meteors. Given the behavior of past Taurid swarms, increased fireball activity may be seen during the last week of October and the first two weeks of November.

A bright Taurid fireball recorded by the NASA All Sky Fireball Network station in Tullahoma, Tennessee in 2014.

A bright Taurid fireball recorded by the NASA All Sky Fireball Network station in Cartersville, Georgia in 2012.

A bright Taurid fireball recorded by the NASA All Sky Fireball Network station in Cartersville, Georgia in 2013. The bright orb is the Moon.

Annual Orionid Meteor Shower Peaks This Week

Orionid meteors appear every year around this time when Earth travels through an area of space littered with debris from Halley’s Comet. This year the peak will occur on the night of Wednesday, Oct. 21 into the morning of Thursday, Oct. 22.

“The Orionids will probably show weak activity this year,” says Bill Cooke of the NASA Meteoroid Environments Office . “Bits of comet dust hitting the atmosphere will probably give us about a dozen meteors per hour.”

The best time to look for Orionid meteors is just before sunrise on Thursday, October 22nd, when Earth encounters the densest part of Halley’s debris stream.

Observing is easy: Wake up a few hours before dawn, go outside and look up. No telescope is necessary to see Orionids shooting across the sky. Viewing conditions are favorable this year, as the light from the gibbous Moon should set by 2 a.m. EDT time, permitting good viewing just before dawn when the rates will be at their highest.

A live stream of the night sky from NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala. will be available via Ustream beginning October 21, at 10 p.m. EDT. The live feed is an alternative for stargazers experiencing bad weather or light-polluted night skies. If the weather in Huntsville is clear, Orionids may be seen in the feed as early as 11:30 p.m. EDT, though the hours before dawn should show the most Orionid activity.

The display will be framed by some of the prettiest stars in the night sky. In addition to Orionids, you’ll see the Dog Star Sirius, bright winter constellations such as Orion, Gemini, and Taurus, and the planets Jupiter and Venus. Even if the shower is a dud, the rest of the sky is dynamite.

Set your alarm, brew some hot chocolate and enjoy the show!

An Orionid meteor recorded by the NASA All Sky Fireball Network station on top of Mt. Lemmon, Arizona on October 13, 2015 at 04:31 a.m. EDT.

An Orionid meteor recorded by the NASA All Sky Fireball Network station on top of Mt. Lemmon, Arizona on October 13, 2015 at 04:31 a.m. EDT. Orionid meteors appear to come from the direction of the constellation Orion, circled in orange.

September 27th Lunar Eclispe

A meteor flashes by the Moon at the beginning of the September 27, total lunar eclipse. From the NASA meteor camera in Mayhill, New Mexico.

NASA Marshall Team Observing and Taking Questions about Upcoming Lunar Eclipse

In the Americas on Sunday night, Sept. 27, we will be treated to a lunar eclipse with its beautiful orange and red colors, a prelude to the fall color of leaves in Earth’s Northern Hemisphere. This eclipse will straddle midnight on Sept. 27, depending on where you live. If observing close to the Greenwich Meridian in the U.K., the eclipse begins just after midnight, in the morning of Sept. 28 at 00:11 Universal Time (UT). But Sept. 28, 00:11 UT, translates to Sept. 27, 8:11 p.m. EDT and 7:11 p.m. CDT.

All of the Americas are well placed to see this eclipse. The table below lists eclipse timing details. If you have questions about this eclipse, you will have an opportunity to ask experts at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama!

About Lunar Eclipses

Throughout human culture, lunar eclipses have been viewed with awe and sometimes fear. Today we know that a total lunar eclipse happens when the full moon passes through the darkest part of Earth’s shadow, the umbra. Near the beginning and ending of an eclipse, the moon moves through a less dark portion of the shadow, called the penumbra, which is hardly visible. The partial phase begins (ends) when the moon enters (leaves) the umbra. When the moon has completely passed into Earth’s shadow, the eclipse is in its total phase.

The length of the eclipse is dependent on the position of the moon along an Earth-sun line. The longest eclipses occur when the moon is directly in line with Earth and sun. The shortest eclipses are when the moon is either above or below that line. The moon does not make its own light; it only reflects the light it receives from the sun. During a lunar eclipse, the moon appears less and less bright as sunlight is blocked by Earth. As totality approaches, more and more of the sunlight reaching the moon does so indirectly; it is refracted around the “edges”of Earth, through our atmosphere.

Because the light is going through the Earth’s atmosphere, almost all colors except red are “filtered” out and the eclipsed moon appears reddish or dark brown. The filtering is done by particulates in the atmosphere; when there have been a lot of fires and/or volcanic eruptions, lunar eclipses will be darker and redder. This eerie but harmless effect has earned the tongue-in-cheek nickname “blood moon.”

Supermoon – No, not SuperMan, SuperMoon

The moon orbits Earth in an ellipse that is almost circular (as is the orbit of most planets around the sun), but because the orbit is elliptical, sometimes the moon is closest to Earth (perigee) and sometimes farthest from Earth (apogee). The position of the moon for the Sept. 27/28 eclipse is very close to perigee, so it will appear a bit larger in the sky than a month from now.

You could measure this, with simple items from around the house. Try using a coin (or button or marble) at arm’s length to block the full moon, do this at a particular time, then try it again for the next several months at full moon, at the same time. If the coin (or other item) covers the moon on Sept. 27 (2015), it will more than cover the moon at later times, proving that the moon is smaller and thus farther away. Also, because the moon is at perigee (close approach to Earth) a supermoon will cause slightly larger tidal effects.

How to View and Ask Questions

NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center will offer a live Ustream view of the lunar eclipse on the Sept. 27, the night of the event, via the Marshall Center Ustream feed. The live feed is an alternative for observers caught with bad weather or light-polluted night skies.

Mitzi Adams, a solar physicist at Marshall, will talk about what viewers are seeing on screen and answering questions from Twitter. To ask a question, use the hashtag: “AskNASA.”

Meteor Over Alabama Brighter than Crescent Moon

On September 16, at 8:22:25 PM local time, NASA meteor cameras in north Georgia and western North Carolina detected a bright fireball over middle Alabama. First seen at an altitude of 45 miles above Paul M. Grist State Park, near Selma, Alabama, the 6 inch diameter chunk of asteroid moved east at a speed of 38,000 miles per hour before burning up some 28 miles above northern Elmore County. At its most intense, the meteor was even brighter than a crescent Moon.

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West Virginia Fireball

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A bright meteor occurred over West Virginia last night at 9:27 EDT. It was seen across Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia, North Carolina, and Maryland! NASA’s Pennsylvania and Ohio all sky cameras caught it near the edge of the field-of-view, but what also saw it was an EarthCam located on the Washington Monument!