[meteorite-list] Fusion Crusted "Meteoroids"

From: Mr EMan <mstreman53_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Wed, 25 Mar 2009 12:05:32 -0700 (PDT)
Message-ID: <508670.28592.qm_at_web55206.mail.re4.yahoo.com>

A Caveat is we don't know how many are captured to finally disintegrate, how many are consumed by the sun, and how many are slung from the solar system via gravity assist.

On the other hand...18,379,846.7 Angels can dance on the head of a pin but not all at once. This represents the erosion of the pin head to zero mass assuming an ablation of 6,867,891 atoms per step starting with an iron pin of .2 grams. Ok the real point is I doubt there is enough data to even estimate but dang sure sounds good.

I see from the trends of the past few weeks that "fusion crust" remain one of the most mistaken concepts in our hobby so time for another treatise on fusion crust. But not now...

Elton




--- On Wed, 3/25/09, Meteorites USA <eric at meteoritesusa.com> wrote:

> From: Meteorites USA <eric at meteoritesusa.com>
> Subject: Re: [meteorite-list] Fusion Crusted "Meteoroids"
> To: "meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com" <meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com>
> Date: Wednesday, March 25, 2009, 1:52 PM
> Anyone remember this one? ;)
>
> THE GREAT DAYLIGHT FIREBALL OF 1972
>
> This grazing of our atmosphere would cause fusion crust.
> This means that the Great Fireball is a meteoroid with
> fusion crust.
>
> Over Jackson Wyoming:
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=It5EztnIdHc
> Over Canada: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AaxagBP0IoY
> http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap090302.html
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Great_Daylight_1972_Fireball
> Earth Grazing Asteroids (PDF):
> http://www.lpi.usra.edu/meetings/lpsc1994/pdf/1142.pdf
>
> Fusion Crusted Meteoroids.
>
> The video shows a great example of it and science knows
> that this happens. How often it happens and how many are
> there is the question? If this happens once every 10,000
> years (hypothetical) then that would mean there may be
> hundreds of thousands if not millions of them out there.
>
> ---------------------------
> 1 Every 10,000 years
> 100 Every 1 Million years
> 1000 Every 10 Million Years
> 10,000 Every 1 Hundred Million Years
> 100,000 Every 1 Billion Years
> ---------------------------
>
> That's if you count just Earth. There are 7 other
> planets out there not counting Pluto. Keeping in mind the
> likelyhood of a meteoroid crossing the orbit of a planet at
> a shallow enough angle, are Neptune's, Uranus' and
> Saturn's, Jupiter's, Mars', Venus', and
> Mercury's atomospheres thick enough to bounce a
> meteoroid off of and create fusion crust? And if so could we
> safely say that there's hundreds of thousands if not
> millions of fusion crusted meteoroids and asteroids out
> there floating around? I would venture to "guess"
> that it might happen a bit more than once every 10,000
> years. The odds are good that it happens far more often.
> Think about it for a second. What's the likelyhood that
> it would be caught on tape if it happened only once every
> ten thousand years? We see daylight fireballs many times per
> year, how many of those are Earth-Grazing meteoroids or
> asteroids and never burn up completely?
>
> Can we agree that 70% of the meteorites that actually
> strike Earth land in the oceans since water covers 70% of
> the planet. Furthermore, since we only occupy a small
> percentage of available land mass then that leaves a HUGE
> amount of land that is either uninhabited or inhabited by
> native peoples that have no contact with the outside world.
> Meaning that any meteor fireball that passes over or impacts
> in these areas are NOT ever reported. I know we can make
> educated guesses about how many times this might happen
> based on observations from many points on our planet that we
> actually occupy.
>
> Isn't there hard data out there on these types of
> actual Earth-Grazing meteoroids and asteroids? The ones that
> actually enter our atmosphere and then leave to go flying
> back out into our solar system. Based on that data
> couldn't you make "an educated guess"?
> Can't we take data from these events and figure the time
> between them and estimate a number, then divide that number
> into say 4.5 billion years? (If you figure the Earth and
> solar system is that old, which by the way is a guess too,
> albeit an educated one) I'm sure there will be people to
> argue this point to the end of time.
>
> Still think there aren't many fusion crusted meteoroids
> out there?
>
>
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Received on Wed 25 Mar 2009 03:05:32 PM PDT