Comments on: Update: meteorite from California fireball recovered

By: Jeff

Jeff — Sat, 27 Oct 2012 03:29:03 +0000

Did anyone see the fireball heading North to South over the San Ramon Valley? This occurred around 8PM Oct. 26th. It traveled in a similar line as the one mentioned in this blog which I saw as well while walking my dog. I’ve seen shooting stars/meteors before, but have never seen them traveling sideways in a similar path as as an Airliner.

By: Doug

Doug — Fri, 26 Oct 2012 22:54:50 +0000

VinceRN: No…no you do not. They won’t give you superpowers, and your insurance won’t pay you because they’d consider it “an act of God”.

By: silence

silence — Thu, 25 Oct 2012 20:51:59 +0000

Local news sources are reporting that additional pieces of the meteor have been recovered, and that the object mentioned in this blog post was in fact a piece of the meteorite after all.

See http://www.mercurynews.com/bay-area-news/ci_21854016/novato-womans-find-its-meteorite-no-its-rock

By: Niall

Niall — Wed, 24 Oct 2012 19:18:31 +0000

“This chunk is small, though, and given how bright the fireball was and how it was seen to fragment, I’d think bigger pieces must have fallen.”

Right, why then do you run with the headline ‘meteorite from California fireball recovered’?

This is obviously just a pebble from that enormous fireball. These things scatter enormous quantities of debris in their wake. Luckily on this occasion, most of it was scattered over the Pacific Ocean. They weren’t so lucky in Louisiana last Monday night.

By: dcsohl

dcsohl — Wed, 24 Oct 2012 17:07:08 +0000

Phil, October 25th (the time on your “update to the update”) hasn’t happened yet. That’s tomorrow…

By: Chelsea

Chelsea — Wed, 24 Oct 2012 13:29:23 +0000

Problem with advertising coverage of meteor hits is that it would bring out the scam artists trying to make false claims for meteor hits.

By: Joseph G

Joseph G — Tue, 23 Oct 2012 23:09:18 +0000

@8 Squeeself: Pretty sure that meteorites fall under “acts of God” in insurance policies, and I highly doubt their’s meteorite insurance addons like there are flooding ones
That said, given how rare and (relatively) inexpensive it’d be, I don’t know why an insurance company wouldn’t just cover it anyway and do some crazy advertising about “Meteor crash through your roof? We’ve got that covered.” or some such. I mean, it would fit right into one of those Allstate commercials.

Bahahaha! That would be awesome! I can just see that “mayhem” guy plummeting headfirst through the atmosphere trailing fire, calmly turning to the camera going “I’m a meteor…”
*Crunch!*
*”Meteor” guy lying in the basement in a small crater after having crashed through a Wile E. Coyote-style man-shaped hole in the roof and floor*
“And if you have some cut-rate home insurance, you could be paying for this yourself.”

@13Jay Fox: “Hammerstone”? Cool! I wonder where the increase in value comes from? Are they more scientifically valuable because they haven’t embedded themselves in dirt, or is it more of an arbitrary human thing?

By: Jon Hanford

Jon Hanford — Tue, 23 Oct 2012 20:31:04 +0000

@ CatMom (15),

That was the Peekskill meteorite, a 12.4 kg chrondrite that was found embedded in the trunk of a Chevy Malibu and was sold for over $69,000:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peekskill_meteorite

http://www.daviddarling.info/encyclopedia/P/Peekskill_meteorite.html

By: CatMom

CatMom — Tue, 23 Oct 2012 19:26:03 +0000

Remember the meteorite that hit a parked car several years back? I think the car’s owner sold the car to a museum and got a nice chunk of change in return.

By: Matt B.

Matt B. — Tue, 23 Oct 2012 18:40:30 +0000

Hm, my estimate was right. A sphere 4.5 cm in diameter and massing 60 g would be only 1.26 times as dense as water. If this meteorite is actually metallic, I guess it’s far from spherical and the 4- to 5-cm size is the longest dimension.