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Re: When Does a Meteorite become a Meteorite?


richard>>Websters
III International gives "meteoroid" to be the object in space or the
pre-incandescent particle "without relation to the phenomena it produces
when entering the earth's atmosphere."

When the meteoroid by that definition (which sounds good to me) produces
the phenomena (i.e., flame or luminosity) you apparently want to call
the phenomena a "meteor" and I want to call the particle AND the
phenomena it produces a "meteor." By your definition, in the dark period
the "meteor" would have ceased to exist and the particle would still be
a "meteoroid" (and therefore no new definition would be needed for the
dark period; unless--as someone suggested--you call it a meteorite
during the dark period which I think only complicates matters worse).<<

Okay, by the webster definition for meteoroid which you are going by and 
accept, it states that the object is in "space". After the object becomes a 
glowing meteor due to the earth's atmosphere and then extinguishes, the 
object is no longer considered to be in space or with it's own independent 
orbit. The definition of meteoroid no longer defines what the object is. This 
object shouldn't no longer be referred to as a meteoroid since "meteoroid" is 
the precursor to it being a meteor. After extinguishment, it has fulfilled 
it's role as being a meteor. What definition is left afterwards that 
describes the object most closely? The closest to definition that doesn't 
significantly change anything, other than the actual plopping on earth would 
simply be a "meteorite". 
GeoZay

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