September 7 fireball over Thailand: Meteorite measured 3.5m, weighed 66 tonnes

[webfact]

September 7 fireball the biggest ever seen this year



BANGKOK: -- The meteorite which struck the Thai sky over Kanchanaburi province on September 7 was the biggest ever entered the Earth’s atmosphere this year, said Mr Sarun Posayachinda, deputy director of National Astronomical Research Institute, on Monday.

Citing an information received from Nasa, he said that the meteorite was measured at 3.5 metre in diameter weighing about 66 tonnes entered the Earth’s atmosphere at a speed of 75,600 kilometres per hour. The fireball was the brightest at an altitude of about 29 kilometres from the Earth, he added.

Mr Sarun disclosed that the force of the impact when the meteorite hit the Earth’s atmosphere was equal to the explosion of 3.9 kilotonnes of TNT or one-fourths of the explosion of the atomic bomb which was dropped into Hiroshima.

Debris from the explosion of the meteorite have scattered in an area about 30 square kilometer in Saiyoke national park in Kanchanaburi.

However, Mr Sarun said no debris have been located yet.

Source: http://englishnews.thaipbs.or.th/september-7-fireball-the-biggest-ever-seen-this-year


-- Thai PBS 2015-09-15

[BSJ]

Has anyone released the info that the meteor was solid gold and it's just laying in pieces on the ground in the park "scattered in an area about 30 square kilometer in Saiyoke national park". Maybe the government is keeping quiet about that!

[ezzra]

Chunks of meteorite can fetch good money and I'm surprised that a whole local villages hasn't descended on the area yet

in a frenzy search for those rocks....

[BwindiBoy]

One "ever" too many in this headline...

[thesetat2013]

If they have yet to find any pieces of it then how do they know the size and weight of it?

[arfurcrown]

I would be interested to know what sort of visa an alien object from space needs to enter Thailand (visa on entry perhaps?) and also does it have to report every ninety days?

[doremifasol]

Couldn't have been 65 or 67 tonnes .............could it?

[Wilsonandson]

Has anyone released the info that the meteor was solid gold and it's just laying in pieces on the ground in the park "scattered in an area about 30 square kilometer in Saiyoke national park". Maybe the government is keeping quiet about that!

Your quite right, meteorites are rarer than gold and therefore can fetch alot of money. http://geology.com/meteorites/value-of-meteorites.shtml

[NongKhaiKid]

All these figures must equate to Lottery Numbers.

[crusty]

Has anyone released the info that the meteor was solid gold and it's just laying in pieces on the ground in the park "scattered in an area about 30 square kilometer in Saiyoke national park". Maybe the government is keeping quiet about that!

Your quite right, meteorites are rarer than gold and therefore can fetch alot of money. http://geology.com/meteorites/value-of-meteorites.shtml

Another fallout due to climate change !

[alfredthegreat]

One fourths!!!!!

[Toknarok]

I'm wondering if any bits of the meteorite are located who actually legally owns them. The reason I'm asking is that a few years ago a small meteorite landed next to a couple of kids playing on a beach South of Perth Australia. The media got to hear of this and it was then pointed out that space debris of this nature automatically became Crown Property and the kids had to surrender their find to the West Australian Museum.

Not that I think for one moment that a Thai finding such an object would be concerned as to is proper ownership.

[OOLEEBER]

Couldn't have been 65 or 67 tonnes .............could it?

Yes. They can be 3-5g per cm3. I make that av 171,500 Kgs (= 190 tonnes) if it was 3.5m square so assuming it was round we could shave off a lot and bring it down to 65 tonnes.

[jaywalker]

Couldn't have been 65 or 67 tonnes .............could it?

Yes. They can be 3-5g per cm3. I make that av 171,500 Kgs (= 190 tonnes) if it was 3.5m square so assuming it was round we could shave off a lot and bring it down to 65 tonnes.

I had to ponder the size/weight thing a bit myself, till I put it in some relate-able terms in my head & got away from the metric system a bit.

Roughly 15 feet X 15 feet X 15 feet (solid) & weighed roughly the same as an Abrams tank. Sounds possible/reasonable.

I'm assuming the size calculations were done by NASA or the EUSA from the video footage & is a best guess.

[FangFerang]

Couldn't have been 65 or 67 tonnes .............could it?

Yes it could. It is greatly fortunate that it exploded before impact. In Tunganista Russia this happened around a hundred years ago, and leveled several square kilometers of trees when the meteorite exploded in the air near the ground.

The impact force would have been catastrophic.

It was a near miss.

[AleG]

If they have yet to find any pieces of it then how do they know the size and weight of it?

There are hundreds of infrasonic monitoring stations around the world that have been built to enforce nuclear weapons treaties; they are also used to collect data on meteor events and the size and energy release can be estimated that way.

[Pib]

Couldn't have been 65 or 67 tonnes .............could it?

No, 66 tons was all that was needed to have the biggest for the year....remember, Thailand always wants to be number one. I figure this 66 ton estimate has as much accuracy as Tourism Authority of Thailand's wild-ass guesses estimates.

[jinjin]

Those Monkeys here dont even know if they see one. Let alone how to find the Meteorite.

[oldsailor35]

Referring to these headlines, is that "Ever seen" or "Seen this year" ?

[masuk]

If they have yet to find any pieces of it then how do they know the size and weight of it?

If they knew all this before it arrived, was there any warning?

One of these landing on your car could ruin your whole day!

[MaxYakov]

Couldn't have been 65 or 67 tonnes .............could it?

Yes it could. It is greatly fortunate that it exploded before impact. In Tunganista Russia this happened around a hundred years ago, and leveled several square kilometers of trees when the meteorite exploded in the air near the ground.

The impact force would have been catastrophic.

It was a near miss.

My guess is that more damage was done (by the Tunguska event meteor/space craft) due its violent disintegration at a low altitude.

The Hiroshima and Nagasaki A-bomb detonations were air bursts (an altitude of 1,968 ± 50 feet (600 ± 15 m) to maximize its destruction potential.

Of course we all know the Tunguska event was really caused by an alien space craft that had a catastrophic star-drive failure, don't we?

Edited September 15, 2015 by MaxYakov

[Kaoboi Bebobp]

For what it's worth, here's a NASA table of "Fireball and Bolide" reports, with Thailand's at the top. http://neo.jpl.nasa.gov/fireballs/

[jossthaifarang]

If they have yet to find any pieces of it then how do they know the size and weight of it?

NASA, they would have spotted it long ago and they would have known about its approximate point of entry etc. Of coarse they cant say anything, people will go nuts if they know the thing is coming..

[emilymat]

Curious to know. How can they tell its weight and volume and where the debris is scattered if they have not found a single fragment.? I suppose there is some scientific explanation.

[dru2]

Couldn't have been 65 or 67 tonnes .............could it?

Yes it could. It is greatly fortunate that it exploded before impact. In Tunganista Russia this happened around a hundred years ago, and leveled several square kilometers of trees when the meteorite exploded in the air near the ground.

The impact force would have been catastrophic.

It was a near miss.

Several thousands of square kilometres were in fact leveled....

[impulse]

Has anyone released the info that the meteor was solid gold and it's just laying in pieces on the ground in the park "scattered in an area about 30 square kilometer in Saiyoke national park". Maybe the government is keeping quiet about that!

Depending on what kind of meteor it was, with the provenance from the video, it could be worth more than gold.

Not likely, but if I had nothing else more lucrative to do- I'd take my metal detector for a look-see.

[Bulldozer Dawn]

Couldn't have been 65 or 67 tonnes .............could it?

Yes it could. It is greatly fortunate that it exploded before impact. In Tunganista Russia this happened around a hundred years ago, and leveled several square kilometers of trees when the meteorite exploded in the air near the ground.

The impact force would have been catastrophic.

It was a near miss.

Several thousands of square kilometres were in fact leveled....

If a meteor of this size hit the grand palace in North Korea it would trigger world war III

[Thai at Heart]

Thaksin did it.

[easybullet3]

Chunks of meteorite can fetch good money and I'm surprised that a whole local villages hasn't descended on the area yet

in a frenzy search for those rocks....

If they have yet to find any pieces of it then how do they know the size and weight of it?

I havent been watching the news, but havent they found the craching site yet ? (considering that the impact was quarter the size of hiroshima!!)

is there absolutely zero effort to check the crash site and put photos of any crator or damage ?

... And, if no one has found the crash site, then how can they be sure its Kanachanaburi ?

(funny how they NASA gives information about a meteor that thailand is unable to locate).. Lol

Edited September 15, 2015 by easybullet3

[DirtyDan]

If they have yet to find any pieces of it then how do they know the size and weight of it?

Astrophysics. These guys spend years in school calculating the gravity and acceleration of cosmic bodies. My guess would be looking at the video to correlating the fire, sound, and explosion radius to determine what it initially was - density and size. We know the density of air, roughly the speed of the moving object form the videos, back out the rest of the unknowns.

Think of it along the same lines of how they can estimate the speed of a moving vehicle before it crashed during an accident investigation... but with bigger cars in this case.

Not to be confused with astroboy. Completely different subject.

Edited September 15, 2015 by DirtyDan