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Re: What is a bolide? A Term Defined Maybe
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- Subject: Re: What is a bolide? A Term Defined Maybe
- From: larrydavison <larrydavison@greenheart.com>
- Date: Tue, 3 Mar 1998 18:44:28 -0800
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American Hertage Dictionary
bolide) n.
A meteoric fireball or something held to resemble it: ³a world-class
sports car‹quick, agile, lively‹in short, everything car magazines . . .
have ever wanted in a bolide of this type² (Automobile).
[French, from Latin bolis, bolid-, from Greek bolis, missile, javelin,
from ballein, to throw. See gwelú- below.]
The 1973 Introductory Astronomy textbook, written by Nicholas A.
Pananides, states the following.
"when a meteor is bright enough to be visible in the daytime or to cast
shadows at night it is called a fireball; and more rarely, when it
explodes in the atmosphere and produces thunder-like sounds, it is called
a bolide."
So to correct my last post it must of been a fireball not a bolide.
Larry