"Small Nuke" over Utah

[Bravo_One_Three]

This just goes to show: No matter how highly evolved or important we believe we are to the rest of the universe, we're insignificant. Fortunately it detonated in the upper atmosphere. The blast would have been equivalent of simultaneously detonating 14 Daisy Cutters... or possibly two of a certain moderators bowel movements.

While it wouldn't have taken out anything as big as SLC, it would have easily flattened several blocks.

http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/091118-utah-meteor-fireball.html

A space rock exploded in the atmosphere, lighting up the sky over most of Utah just after midnight on Wednesday, according to KSL News.

The news station reportedly fielded hundreds of calls from skywatchers who spotted the fireball from southern Utah to southern Idaho. Reports of observations have also come from Las Vegas and other areas in California.

The meteor exploded with the equivalent of 0.5 to 1 kilotons of TNT, according to spaceweather.com. Then, about six hours later, a "twisting iridescent-blue cloud" lit up the dawn sky for residents in Utah and Colorado.

Meteors are fallen debris from a comet or other space rock. As the debris enters the atmosphere, it heats up and produces the brilliant streaks of light we sometimes call shooting stars. Though most meteors are destroyed during this process, some make it to the ground and are known as meteorites.

However, a NASA ambassador told KSL News the chances of finding a meteor rock from the latest show are small.

"It lasted for about eight to 10 seconds," skywatcher Don White, who was in Wyoming, told KSL News. "I think for about the last three to four seconds of that it was as light as day. I could see the bushes off to the right of the road. It was completely lit up. You'll see the meteors flying across the sky and everything, but I've never seen one come that close."

Spaceweather.com also suggests the fireball was not associated with the Leonid meteor shower currently taking place.

To read the full story and watch video clips of the fireball, check out KSL News coverage (http://www.ksl.com/?nid=148&sid=8714738).

[eltrane]

It was just me getting laid. (any johnny dangerously fans?)

[ET1/ss nuke]

(any johnny dangerously fans?)

:)

Mushroom clouds are beautiful things if you get to watch them without dying. They have their own internal lightning storms that change sequentially through the colors of the rainbow as the cloud rises due to the decay of different isotopes (the strontium-90 makes gloriously irridescent green lightning bolts up and down the cloud column). High altitude bursts (such as the kind used to induce an EMP prior to the arrival of a full strike) can make the sky at sunset or sunrise glow with a blue-green similar to the aurora borealis as the water vapor in the atmosphere gets ionized via beta decay. Like lionfish and coral snakes, some of the most deadly things around are also among the most beautiful. Speaking of women .... :biggrin:

[MoonDog]

Posted by ET1/ss nuke
Mushroom clouds are beautiful things if you get to watch them without dying.

Dude, step away from the reactor window..:biggrin:

[kpel308]

Dude, step away from the reactor window..:biggrin:

What window? I did security at Ford Nuclear Reactor/Phoenix Memorial Lab at the University of Michigan. The pile was a pile of "bricks" down at the bottom of a deep "swimming pool". The water was the only shielding you had. The radiation level in there when the pile was going at 90% was less than what you'd get on a concrete sidewalk out in the sun. I used to eat my lunch in the control room with the techs sometimes.

The beautiful blue Cherenkov light from the water around the pile being ionized was absolutely the prettiest color I've ever seen.

I'd pay to watch a mushroom cloud. Especially if it was coming somewhere a few hundred miles ENE of Baghdad...;)

[NWPTrainer]

Dude, step away from the reactor window..:biggrin:

LMAO, no shit!
ET1, you're nuts brother. I'll settle for seeing mushroom clouds on old newsreel footage and call it good...

[Almighty Bones]

I looked out the window of my kitchen just as it happened. I thought something big had blown up on the ground. Turned night into day. It was pretty amazing even with the bad vantage point I had.

[ichabod1515]

I wonder how many of these rocks enter our atmosphere every day and we don't hear a word about it. I know in KS I've seen several comet or space rocks or whatever they are enter the atmosphere and break up. Makes one wonder if armageddon is upon us....

[FinsUp]

I was in Yellowstone backpacking in September, one night we had finished dinner, hung up the food bags, and were just sitting around waiting for the stars to come out. Looking up, we saw this good sized flaming thing go streaking across the sky from west to east, as it got towards the eastern horizon, it exploded. One of the coolest things I have ever seen in the sky.

[past]

http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/

Of course, not everyone thinks this was just a chunk of rock burning up harmlessly in our atmosphere. Because, after all, why assume it was a natural event that occurs quite often, when you can add layers of nonsense and conspiracy to it? Fark alerted me to the idea that this was actually a nuclear missile shot down over the US, despite the video, pictures, and eyewitness accounts completely contradicting the idea that this was anything other than a meteor. But for some people, facts won’t get in the way of a good story!

Anyway, while spectacular, the Earth is probably subjected to meteors like this several times a year. As I have said before, now that we have security cameras and phones with video, we’ll be seeing more and more of videos like this, which is a good thing: it’ll make people more aware of the sky. I’m all for that!

Pretty cool stuff.