Fireball: Meteor Explodes in Earth Atmosphere | International Space Station

Fireball: Meteor Explodes in Earth Atmosphere | International Space Station

NASA Astronaut Matthew Dominick: "I showed this to a couple of friends yesterday to see what they thought. They both thought it was a meteor exploding in the atmosphere—a rather bright one called a bolide. Timelapse is slowed down to one frame per second for you to see it streaking and then exploding . . . Timelapse was setup over Northern Africa where it was very dark with lightning . . ."

Technical details: 1/2s exposure, ISO 25600, 15mm, T1.8, 1/2s intervalometer, 1 fps for the timelapse playback

Note: Fireballs and bolides are astronomical terms for exceptionally bright meteors that are spectacular enough to to be seen over a very wide area. A fireball is an unusually bright meteor that reaches a visual magnitude of -3 or brighter when seen at the observer’s zenith.

Objects causing fireball events can exceed one meter in size. Fireballs that explode in the atmosphere are technically referred to as bolides although the terms fireballs and bolides are often used interchangeably.

During the atmospheric entry phase, an impacting object is both slowed and heated by atmospheric friction. In front of it, a bow shock develops where atmospheric gases are compressed and heated. Part of this energy is radiated to the object causing it to ablate, and in most cases, to break apart. Fragmentation increases the amount of atmosphere intercepted and so enhances ablation and atmospheric braking. The object catastrophically disrupts when the force from the unequal pressures on the front and back sides exceeds its tensile strength.

Expedition 71 Updates:

https://blogs.nasa.gov/spacestation/

Expedition 71 Crew

Station Commander: Oleg Kononenko (Russia)

Roscosmos (Russia): Nikolai Chub, Alexander Grebenkin (Russia)

NASA: Tracy Dyson, Matthew Dominick, Mike Barrett, Jeanette Epps

NASA’s Boeing Crew Flight Test astronauts Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore

An international partnership of space agencies provides and operates the elements of the International Space Station (ISS). The principals are the space agencies of the United States, Russia, Europe, Japan, and Canada. The ISS has been the most politically complex space exploration program ever undertaken.

Video Credit: NASA's Johnson Space Center/M. Dominick

Duration: 21 seconds

Release Date: Sept. 3, 2024

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