from the Rudolph-getting-pre-Christmas-exercise dept.
Fireball that streaked across Phoenix sky was a meteor, astronomers say
Astronomers say the bright light that streaked across the night sky Tuesday was "almost certainly" a meteor. The city of Phoenix captured the illumination on one of its observation cameras and posted it to Twitter. In the video, a large, glowing bulb appears in the top-right frame and then fades out in three seconds. A smaller light can be seen in the lower portion of the frame, off in the horizon. It happened around 8:30 p.m.
[...] "Given the speed and everything, this was almost certainly a meteor rather than a piece of space junk," said Laurence Garvie, curator of Arizona State University's Center for Meteorite Studies. Specifically, the meteor was a "bolide" — a type of fireball that explodes in a bright terminal flash, according to the American Meteor Society. "This thing wasn't huge. I'm going to guess about 5 feet across. It broke up quite quickly," Garvie said.
Four fireball meteors flashed across the sky over the U.S. and Europe on Tuesday night (archive)
Three other meteors kept the American Meteor Society and the International Meteor Organization very busy on Tuesday night. At 8:40 p.m., a fireball lit up the sky over southern Ohio. Later in the night, two meteors zoomed over Europe — one over Germany and the other over France. More than 1,300 people sent reports to the organizations, making last night the busiest night they've ever had since the online reporting forms were launched.
It looks like the fireballs were at least somewhat related — the Taurid meteor shower peaked on Saturday, and Taurid meteors are still shooting across the sky. "Associated with the comet Encke, the Taurids are actually two separate showers, with a Southern and a Northern component," the American Meteor Society wrote on Wednesday morning. "Both branches of the Taurids are most notable for colorful fireballs and are often responsible for an increased number of fireball reports from September through November."
(Score: 4, Insightful) by donkeyhotay on Thursday November 16 2017, @03:12PM (3 children)
Hello? The Leonids are peaking right now...
http://earthsky.org/tonight/radiant-point-for-leonid-meteor-shower [earthsky.org]
(Score: 4, Informative) by OrugTor on Thursday November 16 2017, @04:30PM
(Score: -1, Troll) by Type44Q on Thursday November 16 2017, @08:37PM (1 child)
So are illiterates who put an "n" in "dammit."
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Thursday November 16 2017, @10:22PM
Are you sure it's not a missing space in "damn it"?
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 3, Funny) by r1348 on Thursday November 16 2017, @03:51PM (1 child)
So it begins...
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Thursday November 16 2017, @04:36PM
You missed an epic chance! https://www.xkcd.com/1022/ [xkcd.com]
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 3, Funny) by Grishnakh on Thursday November 16 2017, @04:00PM (19 children)
Hopefully these are just early fragments from a giant planet-killer asteroid that's about to hit us and put us out of our misery.
Most likely, some advanced alien race has determined that we're unfit as a species and must be eliminated, and they've redirected a large asteroid to do the job for them.
(Score: 4, Informative) by Thexalon on Thursday November 16 2017, @04:14PM (2 children)
... except that in a great moment of international cooperation, the nations of the world somehow manage to send Bruce Willis to blow it up. And then follow that up by forming a world government that gives no rights to anybody who does not serve in the military, and figures out a way to send people across the interstellar distances involved as "mobile infantry".
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 3, Funny) by Nerdfest on Thursday November 16 2017, @05:08PM (1 child)
Dude, I've just been hoping for the asteroid.
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Friday November 17 2017, @05:42PM
Any species that comes up with a movie as bad as "Armageddon" (or worse, "Battlefield: Earth") deserves to get wiped out by an asteroid.
(Score: 3, Informative) by Freeman on Thursday November 16 2017, @04:51PM (1 child)
Starship Troopers - basic plot line. Aliens try to take us out. We shoot stuff. Also, great satire. Methinks, Jonathan Swift would agree.
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 16 2017, @07:42PM
It was only Gubner Cristy smoking a fat joint.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday November 16 2017, @05:24PM (10 children)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 16 2017, @05:47PM (9 children)
Stop threatening to irradiate the surface of a perfectly good class M world. Those things are rare! They make really good vacation destinations.
(Score: 2, Funny) by khallow on Thursday November 16 2017, @06:00PM (6 children)
Who made those threats? And it sure looks like the cure is worse than the disease, much less the mere threat of the disease.
Finally, what are we to do about the Sun? It's been irradiating Earth's surface for 4.5 billion years! No mere threat that.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 16 2017, @06:42PM (5 children)
Are you purposely dense? Maybe you've been trolling SN all this time like EF.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday November 17 2017, @12:51AM (4 children)
Let's just drop the idiotic posturing please and answer the questions. Who has threatened to "irradiate the surface" of Earth? And why do worse to the Earth with said asteroid impact than irradiating the surface of Earth could do?
There are multiple errors here. First, that "irradiating the surface" is a serious enough crime to rationalize genocide of humanity. As I note, even the Sun irradiates the Earth's surface continuously. Thus, an irradiated surface is the normal state of the world and has been so for 4.5 billion years. The accusation is absurd as a result.
Obviously, that post is coyly speaking of widespread nuclear war which would as a significant side effort generate fallout. But that still has the problem that an asteroid impact capable of extinguishing the human race is going to be worse than a global nuclear war which merely kills a significant fraction of humanity - and has the virtue of the instigators of such a war being the first victims of it (which is more than you can say for the mass extinction of humanity for imagined "threats"). The aliens are going to destroy the world to save it? Yeah, right.
Second, what is meant by "threat" [oxforddictionaries.com]? There are two definitions in the dictionary. One is a statement of intent to do harm. For it to be a legally actionable statement though, there has to be credibility. One must have the means to carry the threat out. There is no such person making such threats today.
The other definition of "threat" is the potential to do harm. That is ridiculously vague and open ended. Any immigrant could be a rapist. Should we throw all immigrants in jail for rape? Any child could grow up to be a murderer. Should we put them all to death? Any form of life, no matter how trivial, could evolve to become a future menace to the galaxy. Should we destroy all life? And most relevant, if you're an alien race who has the power to drive another species to extinction with the diversion of a large asteroid, should you not destroy yourself as well?
Either way there is no justification for the extinction of humanity due to a "threat".
To summarize, I get that you and possibly a different AC have feelings. I would suggest thinking as a superior replacement for those feelings. The world is doing better [soylentnews.org] than you realize.
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Friday November 17 2017, @02:46PM (3 children)
Obviously you haven't read entire Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series. Otherwise, you would Know that all it takes is for some alien bureaucrat who needs to check off Done on their make way for new Super Highway. Seriously, after reading that entire series, I realized for the first time how bleak of a world view Atheism is.
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday November 17 2017, @04:47PM (2 children)
Let us keep in mind that an implicit assumption of the argument for human extinction in this thread was that the aliens had superior ethics or morality to humans and were operating on that basis. If they aren't, then such arguments become irrelevant. Why would they care that a perfectly good "class M" planet is irradiated, much less care enough to kill off the apes doing the irradiating?
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Friday November 17 2017, @05:49PM (1 child)
Who said anything about aliens having superior ethics? Maybe the aliens just don't like us, and find us annoying, and want to exterminate us because of that, and because they think it's funny. After all, we've done exactly the same ourselves, so we can't claim any kind of moral high ground. Just look at people who use magnifying lenses on ants; we could be the same to an alien race. Besides, extermination by asteroid is probably quicker and less painful than being forced to fight each other to the death, which is something else that many humans find entertaining.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday November 17 2017, @10:55PM
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Thursday November 16 2017, @07:09PM (1 child)
I never said I agreed with the aliens. I agree, class M worlds should be preserved, as they're rare and make good vacation destinations. This one could easily be cleaned up and made into an excellent vacation world for shore leave and also biological research as soon as the dominant lifeform is eradicated so that its toxic effects can be halted. I hope the aliens will find a less destructive method soon.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday November 17 2017, @04:51PM
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 16 2017, @05:53PM
Amen!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 16 2017, @06:48PM (1 child)
Nah, the problem isn't humanity in general. The real problem is the socio-economic systems we have yet to grow out of. It is a long standing tradition for the wealthy to start wars for profit, and without the propaganda of those assholes the general populace would not have such bloodlust. So basically sociopaths have manipulated the public for millennia and created power structures to reinforce their grip. I would say that right now the average human is ready to make peace with the world and we're well equipped to truly help each other out.
Again, the only thing stopping us are the sociopaths who won't loosen their grip. If aliens were going to stop humanity from harming the planet they would have stepped in a few decades ago.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday November 17 2017, @04:57PM
The same socio-economic systems have resulted in the greatest gain in human well-being, globally, ever. I agree that these are far from perfect, but I think it is wise to recognize what they are doing right as well as what they are doing wrong.
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Thursday November 16 2017, @06:01PM
We have a war to start, people. I'm sure Kim's official biography says something about him controlling the heavens and the stars, so it must be his fault that there was stuff up where the sun didn't shine.