AND, I would expect we’d know about the potential for such ignition source meteorites by now. At the size described here THEY DON’T START FIRES!!!!!

Find me some literature that says I’m wrong. I’m happy to learn new things. Otherwise, the speculation is unnecessary.

In the meantime, I managed to find out, where exactly this incident happened and what the building actually looked like (http://www.spiegel.de/wissenschaft/weltall/0,1518,grossbild-722522-443782,00.html).

The part of the town where the cottage is located is at least 5 km away from the training field on the other side of the town. Any bright object coming from there would have flown over heavily populated city areas. And at the time of the incident (22:38 local time) hundreds of people should have seen it and not just a few.

Especially, since one of the local witnesses said in an interview to the local TV that he saw a bright object as big as a football flying towards the horizon. See also the video in the following article:(http://www.wdr.de/themen/panorama/brand03/troisdorf__meteorit/index.jhtml?rubrikenstyle=panorama) Interstingly enough, the eyewitness did NOT mention any noise coming from the “meteor”.

So personally, I rule the military theory out. I also think, that if some ammunition misfired and went flying over the town, someone of the armed forces would have at least investigated.

According to the eyewitness, the object was as big as a football and flew over quite a distance when he observed it. Pranksters would have to be really talented to manage somehting like that.

The trajectory however is quite interestingly: The object landed near the meadows of the river “Sieg”. And the eyewitnesses were all living in the vicinity and told that the object was flying towards the meadows – meaning the object would have originated in the North seen from the river. And now, guess what is in the north direction? The airport.

This would also explain why not so many people saw it. In that case the object would have flown over relatively sparsly populated area and over some buisness parks – all deserted in the evening.

But if the object came from an airplane and was big enough to be seen across the sky, why didn’t it leave an impact crater as well? It could of course very well be, that the object appeard much bigger than it really was. Still, how can something come apart from an airplane and start a fire? Although from the look of that shed it really did not take much to start the fire.

The mystery will probably never be solved. Still, if a meteor was responsable for the fire I would at least suspect some remenants of the meteorite or at least an impact crater in the debris.

The assumption all astronomers are familiar with meteorites is a common one. At the UW here where I’ve taken all my meteor-wrongs (hey they were darn close, metal and all) I take them to the geology department where the meteorite expert is. The astronomy department is never sure what to make of the rocks.

charles simkins Says:
…. Speculation on whether or not a meteorite is hot or cold rather than observable facts is important. ….If you find evidence of a meteorite, it is conclusive to a high degree. If no evidence is found, then the probability is very slim. A larger meteorite on a tangential trajectory might blow up and scatter hot enough pieces to start a fire. But unless you can detect evidence, you must assume it didn’t happen. None of us can examine this and to rule out hot meteorites requires physical evidence which we don’t have….

Chuck, it isn’t like there haven’t been enough meteorite falls to already have enough evidence. I assure you, they don’t start fires short of asteroid size and maybe potentially knocking over a lantern or something.

Meteorites can knock a hole in your roof (several well documented cases) and a hole in your car (at least one famous case). Meteorites large enough to form an impact crater melt the ejecta from the crater (many examples of that in the form of tektites).

If there were smaller meteorites causing fires there would be abundant evidence. There isn’t.

I hate it when people stereo type other people, but it’s alright when I do it