A meteorite that fell and hit the Earth was captured on surveillance video in Spokane, Washington. The meteorite was seen across 4 states and witnesses also reported hearing a sonic boom followed by some minor shaking of the ground after impact. Scientists suspect the approximate size of the meteorite to have been that of a "briefcase".

The point of impact and the meteorite have not yet been found. See video here.

A meteorite that fell and hit the Earth was captured on surveillance video in Spokane, Washington. The meteorite was seen across 4 states and witnesses also reported hearing a sonic boom followed by some minor shaking of the ground after impact. Scientists suspect the approximate size of the meteorite to have been that of a "briefcase".

The point of impact and the meteorite have not yet been found. See video here.

Hope nobody was hurt.....that said, pretty sweet video. I hope they find something interesting.

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Thanks for the Post BentStar . . .

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That's brilliant. The camera was perfectly placed for that.
Good spot, thanks.

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The same meteorite was seen from Calgary Alberta too.

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great video.

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If the direction of the impact could be determined to an accuracy of +- one
degree by the use of widely separated photos, for every mile of distance the photos were from ground zero, the area of uncertainty would be +- 1/57 mile or about 90 feet in radius. When the rock(s) hit they probably were going at only terminal falling velocity through the air.

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Don't know about that, but as 'sonic booms' were noted, that indicates a pretty high velocity, which is what you'd expect from a meteor the size of a briefcase - it wouldn't be slowed so much by the atmosphere.

I dare say it would have made a fair dent in the ground too; Typically a crater 10 - 50 times the diameter of the object.

Unfortunately, I'm still trying to view the video - it doesn't work for me for some reason; I'm just going to have a mess with the security settings...

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Chances are that rock slowed down enough to make just a small crater. If the crater had been that much bigger than the rock it would have been curtains for many people.

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Wow, that is an amazing video. It is impressive how bright meteor(ites) can be.

I saw an impressive meteor(ite) once. I was stationed at Keesler AFB (Biloxi, Ms) at the time. Anyway, I was walking towards my car (facing east) when I noticed something brilliant white in the night sky. At first, I thought it might be a flare since I was facing towards Keesler. At the time, I was at a plaza in Biloxi. I thought it strange that a flare would be released over Keesler. However, within seconds I realized that this thing was moving. Moving FAST. It passed almost directly over my head. I knew by then that it had to be a meteor(ite), but was taken back by the "sparks" coming off of it. The "sparks" made sense since it was shedding matter, but what took me back was how it actually DID look like one of those cheesy meteorites you see in 1950's films, with their "electrical sparks" coming off of it. I watched it as it passed overhead and traveled west. Simply watching it travel west, you would have sworn that the thing landed "just a few blocks down the road". However, when the sound arrived after it passed overhead you were able to scale it's distance a bit. The sound was weird: a sort of "stuttering sputtering".

Anyway, the news media later reported it. If it did make it all the way to the ground, the media reported that it would have landed in a Louisiana swamp. I don't believe anyone found it.

I've seen a few fireballs, two of them during daylight hours.

The most memorable one was seen whilst out night-fishing with some friends, back in the mid-80s.

It was a moonlit night, and a clear sky.
This fireball appeared and swept fairly rapidly right across the visible sky - probably a good 100 degrees or more of arc, taking about 2 seconds or so to travel the distance. It was brilliant white and lit up the area quite brightly for a moment.

The best bit though was the trail it left:
It looked remarkably like a slightly dispersed jet contrail, and was brightly illuminated by the moon, and remained visible for about 20 minutes after the event.

There was no sound whatsoever, so I can only assume the burn had occurred at great height.

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Here's a video of a local news report regarding the meteorite.

Here's a video of a local news report regarding the meteorite.

Thanks for the Video BentStar . . . good un

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Any chance this was debris from the artificial satellite that was shot down a few nights ago?

A meteorite that fell and hit the Earth was captured on surveillance video in Spokane, Washington. The meteorite was seen across 4 states and witnesses also reported hearing a sonic boom followed by some minor shaking of the ground after impact. Scientists suspect the approximate size of the meteorite to have been that of a "briefcase".

The point of impact and the meteorite have not yet been found. See video here.

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Any chance this was debris from the artificial satellite that was shot down a few nights ago?

A meteorite that fell and hit the Earth was captured on surveillance video in Spokane, Washington. The meteorite was seen across 4 states and witnesses also reported hearing a sonic boom followed by some minor shaking of the ground after impact. Scientists suspect the approximate size of the meteorite to have been that of a "briefcase".

The point of impact and the meteorite have not yet been found. See video here.

The video of the meteorite is dated the morning of Tuesday 2/19/08. IIRC, the U.S. shot down the satellite the early evening of Wednesday 2/20/08 which was the same night of the lunar eclipse. So unless the U.S. lied about when they shot down the satellite, this cannot be debris.

Youtube has a ton of really cool meteor(ite) videos. One phenomena that I've noted is that almost all the meteor(ites) seem to "flare up" intensely right before passing below the horizon. The "flare ups" don't appear to be from impacts. I'm not even going to speculate on this phenomena, except to say that it is interesting.

I don't recall if I saw a "flare up" with the meteorite that I saw or not. I remember the sound vividly though. It sounded like bacon frying in a pan. It was actually very similar to the sound you hear when watching a live shuttle launch from the beach -- which I've always also described as a "frying bacon" sound.

[Edit Add: I had the fortune of living on the Space Coast for a period of time. I think everyone that lives in the SE and is interested should make at least one trip to watch a launch. Watching launches, whether shuttle or deltas, never get old. It is a completely different experience than watching them on TV. On TV, they look and sound too "clean".]

Youtube has a ton of really cool meteor(ite) videos. One phenomena that I've noted is that almost all the meteor(ites) seem to "flare up" intensely right before passing below the horizon. The "flare ups" don't appear to be from impacts. I'm not even going to speculate on this phenomena, except to say that it is interesting.

As the meteor heats up it is likely to shatter. If/when that happens there is more surface area to "burn" so you see a "flare up".

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BOINC WIKI

BOINCing since 2002/12/8

Youtube has a ton of really cool meteor(ite) videos. One phenomena that I've noted is that almost all the meteor(ites) seem to "flare up" intensely right before passing below the horizon. The "flare ups" don't appear to be from impacts. I'm not even going to speculate on this phenomena, except to say that it is interesting.

As the meteor heats up it is likely to shatter. If/when that happens there is more surface area to "burn" so you see a "flare up".

Hi,

Yeah, this causes the flash(es), but what I was looking at was the disproportion of flashing when the meteor(ites) are on the horizon. Almost all of the videos show "horizon flashing". Very few show "directly overhead flashing" or "directly overhead breakups". (I.e., search youtube for "Mexico meterorite" for one exception.)

After thinking about it, I believe I have the answer: Meteor(ites) can be seen for hundreds of miles, so for the majority of witnesses, the meteor(ite) should be on the horizon when it slams into the heavy atmosphere. Also, after reading a bit, I'll also speculate that ones that "flash", but continue to burn after "flashes" are likely to be rocky while the one that I saw was likely to be composed of heavy metal (iron) since it was so low that it was also audible. It had already survived the "heavy burn phase" after entering the atmosphere over Alabama or Florida...

I think you are right on for one of the prime reasons of horizon flashes. Another is that the object is not going to flash/break up immediately on contact with the atmosphere, it will take some time before the stresses build up enough to cause it. So the object will be closer to the surface and therefore closer to the horizon for more observers.

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BOINC WIKI

BOINCing since 2002/12/8

Youtube has a ton of really cool meteor(ite) videos. One phenomena that I've noted is that almost all the meteor(ites) seem to "flare up" intensely right before passing below the horizon. The "flare ups" don't appear to be from impacts. I'm not even going to speculate on this phenomena, except to say that it is interesting.

As the meteor heats up it is likely to shatter. If/when that happens there is more surface area to "burn" so you see a "flare up".

Hi,

Yeah, this causes the flash(es), but what I was looking at was the disproportion of flashing when the meteor(ites) are on the horizon. Almost all of the videos show "horizon flashing". Very few show "directly overhead flashing" or "directly overhead breakups". (I.e., search youtube for "Mexico meterorite" for one exception.)

After thinking about it, I believe I have the answer: Meteor(ites) can be seen for hundreds of miles, so for the majority of witnesses, the meteor(ite) should be on the horizon when it slams into the heavy atmosphere. Also, after reading a bit, I'll also speculate that ones that "flash", but continue to burn after "flashes" are likely to be rocky while the one that I saw was likely to be composed of heavy metal (iron) since it was so low that it was also audible. It had already survived the "heavy burn phase" after entering the atmosphere over Alabama or Florida...

Thanks for posting. Very dramatic! Lucky position for the camera.

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