Being the only U.S. Government entity charged with monitoring the meteor environment, the Meteoroid Environment Office (MEO) has deployed a network of allsky and wide field meteor cameras, along with the appropriate software tools to quickly analyze data from these systems. However, the coverage of this network is still quite limited, forcing the incorporation of data from other cameras posted to the internet in analyzing many of the fireballs reported by the public and media. Information on these bright events often needs to be reported to NASA Headquarters by noon the following day; thus a procedure has been developed that determines the analysis process for a given fireball event based on the types and amount of data available. The differences between these analysis processes are shown by looking at four meteor events that the MEO responded to, all of which were large enough to produce meteorites

Blaauw, R. C.

Cooke, W. J.

Kingery, A. M.

Moser, D. E.

NASA Technical Reports Server

When the Sky Falls…  
NASA’s Response to bright bolide events over continental USA 
R.C. Blaauw1 , W.J. Cooke2, A.M. Kingery3, D.E. Moser4  
1All Points Logistics/Jacobs ESSSA Group/NASA Meteoroid Environments Office, Huntsville,AL, 35812, USA, rhiannon.c.blaauw@nasa.gov. 
2NASA/MSFC, Huntsville, AL, 35812, USA. 
3ERC/Jacobs ESSSA Group/NASA Meteoroid Environments Office, Huntsville,AL, 35812, USA.  
4Jacobs/Jacobs ESSSA Group/NASA Meteoroid Environments Office, Huntsville,AL, 35812, USA.  
 
Being	  the	  only	  U.S.	  Government	  entity	  charged	  with	  monitoring	  the	  
meteor	  environment,	  the	  Meteoroid	  Environment	  Oﬃce	  (MEO)	  has	  
deployed	  a	  network	  of	  allsky	  and	  wide	  ﬁeld	  meteor	  cameras,	  along	  with	  
the	  appropriate	  software	  tools	  to	  quickly	  analyze	  data	  from	  these	  systems.	  
However,	  the	  coverage	  of	  this	  network	  is	  still	  quite	  limited,	  forcing	  the	  
incorporation	  of	  data	  from	  other	  cameras	  posted	  to	  the	  internet	  in	  
analyzing	  many	  of	  the	  ﬁreballs	  reported	  by	  the	  public	  and	  media.	  
Information	  on	  these	  bright	  events	  often	  needs	  to	  be	  reported	  to	  NASA	  
Headquarters	  by	  noon	  the	  	  following	  day;	  thus	  a	  procedure	  has	  been	  
developed	  that	  determines	  the	  analysis	  process	  for	  a	  given	  ﬁreball	  event	  
based	  on	  the	  types	  and	  amount	  of	  data	  available.	  The	  diﬀerences	  between	  
these	  analysis	  processes	  are	  shown	  by	  looking	  at	  four	  meteor	  events	  that	  
the	  MEO	  responded	  to,	  all	  of	  which	  were	  large	  enough	  to	  produce	  
meteorites.	  
	  
Introduction August 2, 2014 - Alabama 
•  Event	  occurred	  August	  3,2014	  3:29	  UTC	  	  (August	  2,	  2014	  10:19	  PM	  CDT).	  
•  Ideal	  event	  –	  seen	  in	  4	  of	  the	  Meteoroid	  Environment	  Oﬃce’s	  allsky	  
cameras.	  
•  122	  eye-­‐witness	  reports	  on	  the	  American	  Meteor	  Society’s	  website	  
•  Trajectory	  and	  lightcurve	  manually	  found	  using	  METAL	  (METeor	  AnaLzer),	  
custom	  software	  created	  by	  the	  University	  of	  Western	  Ontario’s	  Meteor	  
Physics	  Group.	  
•  Dark	  ﬂight	  calculations	  incorporate	  winds	  at	  the	  time	  to	  ﬁnd	  approximate	  
location	  of	  meteorites.	  
•  Apparent	  magnitude	  of	  -­‐11.5,	  equating	  to	  an	  object	  tens	  of	  kg	  in	  mass.	  	  
Event	  as	  seen	  in	  the	  MEO’s	  Huntsville	  and	  Tullahoma	  allsky	  cameras.	  
Lightcurve	  of	  meteor	  from	  Huntsville	  and	  
Tullahoma	  cameras	  –	  the	  two	  cameras	  with	  the	  
clearest	  view	  of	  the	  event.	  The	  ﬂattening	  of	  the	  
light	  curve	  as	  it	  brightens	  is	  clear	  evidence	  that	  
the	  light	  from	  the	  meteor	  saturated	  the	  cameras.	  
Thus	  a	  saturation	  correction	  was	  necessary	  which	  
resulted	  in	  a	  peak	  apparent	  magnitude	  of	  
approximately	  -­‐11.5.	  	  
Orbit	  visualization	  of	  meteoroid.	  Visualization	  
tool	  was	  funded	  by	  the	  MEO,	  and	  created	  by	  
Dr.	  David	  Clark	  of	  the	  University	  of	  Western	  
Ontario.	  
Trajectory	  of	  the	  meteor	  (yellow)	  with	  respect	  to	  
the	  four	  allsky	  cameras	  (blue).	  The	  meteor	  was	  
ﬁrst	  seen	  at	  a	  height	  of	  92	  km	  over	  Tennessee,	  
moving	  25	  km/s	  and	  was	  last	  seen	  over	  eastern	  
Alabama	  at	  a	  height	  of	  28	  km	  height	  moving	  6	  
km/s.	  Its	  deceleration	  and	  low	  ending	  height	  
indicates	  high	  probability	  of	  dropping	  
meteorites.	  
Dark	  ﬂight	  calculations.	  Using	  the	  ﬁnal	  position	  
and	  velocity	  of	  the	  meteor,	  along	  with	  
incorporating	  winds	  at	  the	  time,	  a	  map	  is	  
created	  to	  show	  where	  particles	  of	  various	  sizes	  
may	  have	  landed	  on	  the	  ground.	  
November 3, 2014 - West Virginia 
•  Event	  occurred	  November	  3,	  2014	  23:23	  UTC	  or	  18:23	  EST.	  
•  Event	  was	  just	  south	  of	  the	  MEO’s	  north-­‐east	  allsky	  network	  and	  just	  
north	  of	  the	  MEO’s	  south-­‐east	  allsky	  network.	  
•  1,185	  eye-­‐witness	  reports	  on	  the	  American	  Meteor	  Society’s	  website.	  
•  Time	  of	  event	  found	  by	  mining	  tweets	  on	  Twitter	  containing	  ‘meteor’	  or	  
‘ﬁreball’.	  
•  Web	  search	  of	  event	  surfaced:	  
	  	  	  	  	  	  	  	  	  	  -­‐Two	  dashcam	  videos:	  one	  from	  a	  police	  car	  in	  Benwood,	  WV	  and	  the	  
	  	  	  	  	  	  	  	  	  	  	  	  	  other	  from	  a	  car	  sitting	  in	  traﬃc	  in	  Atlanta,	  GA.	  
	  	  	  	  	  	  	  	  	  	  -­‐Video	  from	  a	  public	  webcam	  (EarthCam)	  located	  on	  the	  Washington	  
	  	  	  	  	  	  	  	  	  	  	  	  	  Monument	  in	  DC.	  
	  	  	  	  	  	  	  	  	  -­‐Video	  from	  a	  private	  allsky	  camera	  located	  in	  Elk	  Creek,	  VA.	  
•  Locations	  of	  all	  videos/images	  were	  found	  and	  the	  azimuth	  of	  the	  start	  
and/or	  end	  point	  of	  the	  meteor	  was	  mapped.	  
•  Despite	  the	  event	  not	  being	  seen	  in	  any	  MEO	  cameras,	  the	  time	  it	  
occurred,	  where	  it	  occurred,	  and	  the	  direction	  it	  was	  moving	  were	  all	  
delivered	  quickly	  to	  Headquarters.	  
Location	  of	  the	  meteor,	  start	  and	  end	  points,	  as	  found	  by	  
using	  videos	  and	  images	  of	  the	  event	  found	  on	  the	  web.	  A	  
trajectory	  found	  by	  the	  American	  Meteor	  Society	  using	  eye-­‐
witness	  reports	  is	  plotted,	  which	  matched	  our	  results.	  MEO	  
allsky	  camera	  located	  and	  (conservative)	  approximate	  reach	  
is	  also	  shown.	  
Meteor	  as	  seen	  from	  police	  car	  
dashcam	  in	  Benwood,	  WV.	  
Video	  found	  on	  youtube.com	  
and	  geolocated.	  
Meteor	  as	  seen	  from	  dashcam	  
in	  Atlanta,	  GA.	  Video	  found	  on	  
youtube.com	  and	  geolocated.	  
Meteor	  as	  seen	  from	  allsky	  
camera	  run	  by	  Robert	  Wilkie	  in	  
Elk	  Creek,	  VA.	  	  
Graph	  of	  the	  number	  of	  tweets	  on	  
Twitter	  containing	  ‘meteor’	  or	  ‘ﬁreball’,	  
used	  to	  determine	  the	  time	  this	  event	  
occurred.	  
Meteor	  as	  seen	  from	  publically	  
accessed	  webcam	  located	  on	  the	  
Washington	  Monument	  in	  DC.	  
November 7, 2013 - California 
October 30, 2012 - Addison Meteorite Fall 
•  Event	  occurred	  November	  7,	  2014	  3:49:29	  UTC.	  (November	  8,	  	  19:49	  PDT)	  
•  219	  eye-­‐witness	  reports	  on	  the	  American	  Meteor	  Society’s	  website	  
•  Seen	  in	  four	  Sandia	  allsky	  cameras	  (skysentinel.nmsu.edu/allsky)	  
•  Video	  converted	  and	  calibrated	  to	  be	  able	  to	  be	  used	  by	  MEO	  software	  
•  Trajectory	  and	  lightcurve	  manually	  found	  using	  METAL	  (METeor	  
AnaLyzer).	  
•  Apparent	  magnitude	  of	  approximately	  -­‐13,	  equates	  to	  an	  object	  ~	  500	  kg.	  
Trajectory	  of	  event	  (yellow)	  and	  four	  Sandia	  allsky	  
cameras	  which	  detected	  it	  (blue).	  Meteor	  was	  originally	  
moving	  ~	  22.5	  km/s	  and	  showed	  signiﬁcant	  deceleration,	  
but	  was	  hard	  to	  quantify	  since	  the	  event	  was	  seen	  low	  on	  
the	  horizon	  from	  all	  cameras.	  
Meteor	  as	  seen	  in	  Yucca	  (top)	  and	  
Parker	  (bottom),	  part	  of	  the	  Sandia	  
allsky	  camera	  network	  run	  by	  
NMSU.	  Both	  cameras	  were	  located	  
over	  160	  km	  from	  the	  meteor.	  
•  Event	  occurred	  October	  30,	  2012	  ~22:30	  UTC	  (~5:30	  CST).	  
•  Daytime	  ﬁreball	  over	  Alabama.	  	  
•  56	  eye-­‐witness	  reports	  to	  American	  Meteor	  Society,	  from	  Arkansas	  to	  
Florida,	  many	  reporting	  sonic	  booms.	  
•  Doppler	  weather	  radar	  detected	  pieces	  of	  debris	  in	  the	  atmosphere.	  
Doppler	  weather	  radar	  signature	  (thanks	  to	  Marc	  
Fries	  for	  help	  in	  obtaining	  the	  radar	  signature)	  at	  
time	  of	  the	  event.	  As	  it	  was	  a	  clear	  sky	  and	  no	  rain,	  
this	  signature	  was	  from	  meteoritic	  debris,	  
conﬁrming	  the	  location	  and	  time	  of	  the	  meteor	  as	  
well	  as	  existence	  of	  meteorites.	  	  
Two	  meteorites	  were	  found	  under	  the	  
Doppler	  signature.	  This	  particle	  is	  60	  
grams	  and	  was	  found	  by	  search	  team	  
Stephen	  Beck,	  Tommy	  Brown,	  and	  Jerry	  
Hinkle.	  
meteor	  airplane	  
The	  authors	  would	  like	  to	  thank	  The	  Meteor	  Physics	  Group	  at	  the	  University	  of	  Western	  Ontario	  for	  
their	  aid	  in	  developing	  METAL	  and	  the	  orbit	  visualization	  tool,	  and	  the	  American	  Meteor	  Society	  for	  
providing	  the	  bulk	  of	  the	  eye-­‐witness	  reports.	  
https://ntrs.nasa.gov/search.jsp?R=20150009428 2019-08-31T10:29:07+00:00Z


When the Sky Falls NASA's Response to Bright Bolide Events Over Continental USA

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