Tag Archives: meteor

Behold: a meteor, but an especially bright one (even brighter in reality than seen here), and therefore entitled to a more vivid descriptor. To wit:

The International Astronomical Union defines a fireball as a meteor brighter than apparent magnitude -4, which corresponds (roughly) to being brighter than any planet — as well as bright enough to cast a human-noticeable shadow. Pictured, an astrophotographer taking a long-duration sky image captured by accident the brightest meteor he had ever seen. Clearly a fireball, the disintegrating space-rock created a trail so bright it turned night into day for about two seconds earlier this month. The fireball has been artificially dimmed in the featured image to bring up foreground Lake Louise in Alberta, Canada. Although fireballs are rare, many people have been lucky enough to see them. If you see a fireball, you can report it. If more than one person recorded an image, the fireball might be traceable back to the Solar System body from which it was ejected.

(Image: Hao Qin)

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A glorious photo by Gunarto Song of a shooting star appearing to fall into the mouth of Mount Merapi – the most active volcano in Indonesia.

Merapi’s constant activity means that no one is allowed within 5km so, in search of a good shot of the evening scenery, Song set up his camera on Batu Alien – a huge head-shaped stone thrown from the mouth of the volcano during a previous eruption.

From here, he noticed the falling meteor and captured a four-second exposure which has since gone viral.

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To the unaided eye, meteors – while impressive in speed and suddeness – are usually just white steaks across the sky. The cameras sees more. To wit:

Pictured is a Quadrantids meteor captured by camera over Missouri, USA, early this month that was not only impressively bright, but colourful. The radiant grit, likely cast off by asteroid 2003 EH1, blazed a path across Earth’s atmosphere. Colours in meteors usually originate from ionised elements released as the meteor disintegrates, with blue-green typically originating from magnesium, calcium radiating violet, and nickel glowing green. Red, however, typically originates from energised nitrogen and oxygen in the Earth’s atmosphere. This bright meteoric fireball was gone in a flash — less than a second — but it left a wind-blown ionisation trail that remained visible for several minutes.

(Image: Frank Kuszaj)

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bSkPNMjRRio

Earth gets pelted by tiny rocks all the time, but every so often, a real whopper hoves into view (and hopefully glides past).

To put all this into context, here’s a terrifying new size comparison from masters of same, MetaBall Studios.

Previously: It’s What You Do With It That Counts

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Did you catch the annual Perseid meteor shower last night? Of course you did. But it didn’t look like this. Because this (with a little technical adjustment) is what it looked like last year over Slovakia. To wit:

 The featured composite image was taken during last year’s Perseids from the Poloniny Dark Sky Park in Slovakia. The unusual building in the foreground is a planetarium on the grounds of Kolonica Observatory. Although the comet dust particles travel parallel to each other, the resulting shower meteors clearly seem to radiate from a single point on the sky in the eponymous constellation Perseus. The radiant effect is due to perspective, as the parallel tracks appear to converge at a distance, like train tracks. 

(Image: Petr Horálek)

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Mariusz writes:

Let me share my story about how I changed mobile provider from #Meteor to #O2 / Three Ireland…

Day 1 Sunday – I noticed that O2 had a good Bill Pay Plan with #Iphone6 plus128GB and my old iPhone was getting older and older and my contract with Meteor was due to finish so I decided to move to O2. Spent over €400 on my dream phone and after I filled everything online I read that my new phone would be with me within four working days.

Day 5 Thursday – I hadn’t received anything so decided to call Customer Care where I found out after 20 minutes on the phone that they had sent me email with a request for ID scan and credit card statement. Funny thing was I had never received that email.

Day 6 Friday – I called them again to make sure that all of the documents were fine just to be told all was good and I should get everything in four days.

Day 10 Tuesday – I called them again. A customer service representative told me that she would check it and email me later that day.

Day 11 Wednesday – Received email saying that my order was shipped from the warehouse yesterday and I should receive my delivery within the next day or two, I said sweet. I asked for my phone to be delivered to my work. Phone was delivered later on that day after I finished work but that’s no biggie.

Day 12 Thursday – Happy Day, I finally received my phone, woohoo, but hold on a second. A new sim card was forgotten to be included in the package. I emailed Customer Care  to be told that they made a mistake. I say OK, I’m a patient person…

Day 16 Monday – I emailed  Customer Care, I was little bit frustrated at this stage.But two or three hours later I finally received my package. woohoo, I had waited so long for this day, sweet! However…
1 they gave me new number which made no sense because I was moving my old number.
2 the sim card they put in was Micro sim card which DOES NOT fit into an iPhone

At this stage I was like FUPP IT! Later on that day I called Customer Care and told them that I want my money back and I want nothing to do with company which CAN NOT provide simple service and product! Thank you #ThreeIreland you guys have just lost a customer!

FIGHT!

Previously: Threebooting