[meteorite-list] Asteroid 2008 TC3 Fireball Observed from Airliner

From: Alexander Seidel <gsac_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Tue, 07 Oct 2008 21:22:50 +0200
Message-ID: <20081007192250.273840_at_gmx.net>

A member of our German meteorite discussion forum posted a few pics from the Egypt based El Gouna webcam [http://www.kitepower-elgouna.com/en/el_gouna/webcam/], where you can clearly see a brightening of the building in the foreground, exactly at the predicted time, which lasted for about 3-4 seconds, according to the poster. I have not asked him for permission to publish his few screenshots of the event, but may be this camera has sort of a backlog. It is situated as far as about 700 km (450 mi) away from the calculated impact point in northern Sudan, so I suppose it must have been an even more amazing sight from the Aswan area in southern Egypt, closer to the impact point. May be one or the other engineer working at the Aswan embarkment dam can contribute another sighting report, as time goes by. They also may have special webcams at this site, so more clips may surface.

Any more news available? What do the orbital specialists say about the final decay (or may be even touchdown) coordinates, after evaluating final observations? Rob...?

Alex
Berlin/Germany


-------- Original-Nachricht --------
> Datum: Tue, 7 Oct 2008 11:07:53 -0700 (PDT)
> Von: Ron Baalke <baalke at zagami.jpl.nasa.gov>
> An: meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com
> Betreff: [meteorite-list] Asteroid 2008 TC3 Fireball Observed from Airliner

>
> http://www.spaceweather.com/
>
> Space Weather News
> October 7, 2008
>
> ASTEROID IMPACT: Asteroid 2008 TC3 hit Earth this
> morning (Oct. 7th at 0243 UT), exploding in the atmosphere over northern
> Sudan like a kiloton of TNT. Most of the 3-meter-wide asteroid should
> have been vaporized in the atmosphere with only small pieces reaching
> the ground as meteorites. So far, no pictures of the fireball have been
> submitted; the impact occured in a remote area with few (and possibly
> no) onlookers capable of recording the event. Nevertheless, the asteroid
> did strike Earth as predicted.
>
> This confirming report comes from Jacob Kuiper
> <mailto:jacobkuiper at solcon.nl>, General Aviation meteorologist at the
> National Weather Service in the Netherlands: "Half an hour before the
> predicted impact of asteroid 2008 TC3, I informed an official of
> Air-France-KLM at Amsterdam airport about the possibility that crews of
> their airliners in the vicinity of impact would have a chance to see a
> fireball. And it was a success! I have received confirmation that a KLM
> airliner, roughly 750 nautical miles southwest of the predicted
> atmospheric impact position, has observed a short flash just before the
> expected impact time 0246 UTC. Because of the distance it was not a very
> large phenomenon, but still a confirmation that some bright meteor has
> been seen in the predicted direction. Projected on an infrared
> satellite-image
> <http://spaceweather.com/submissions/pics/j/Jacob-Kuiper-0810070300zmet7IRposplane_1223352768.jpg>
> of Meteosat-7 of 0300 UTC, I have indicated the position of the plane
> (+) and the predicted impact area in Sudan (0)."
>
> 2008 TC3 was discovered on Oct. 6th by astronomers using the Mt. Lemmon
> telescope in Arizona as part of the NASA-funded Catalina Sky Survey for
> near-Earth objects. Asteroids the size of 2008 TC3 hit Earth every few
> months, but this is the first time one has been discovered before it hit.
>
>
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Received on Tue 07 Oct 2008 03:22:50 PM PDT