[meteorite-list] Bright Meteor Observed Over Oregon

[Ron Baalke]

http://space.com/missionlaunches/050720_flyby_update.html

Did you see Tuesday's meteor? Scientist wants to hear about it
Mail Tribune (Oregon)
July 20, 2005

Mike O'Grady was concentrating on his second shot at the Rogue Valley
Country Club golf course Tuesday when he saw a flaming object fall from
the summer sky.

"It definitely had some body to it and it had blue-ish and red flames
coming off it," said O'Grady.

It was the second time in a dozen years that O'Grady, 53, witnessed what
a Portland scientist speculated was a bright meteor that shot southward
across the state.

A half-dozen reports of a fiery object were tracked after the 2:17 p.m.
event, said Dick Pugh of the Cascadia Meteorite Laboratory in Portland.

"It was a big meteor, a fireball," said Pugh.

Staff at the National Weather Service office in Medford received three
reports of a flaming fireball, including one from as far as Roseburg,
said Spencer Higginson, a service hydrologist.

The last time O'Grady saw a meteor was Sept. 8, 1993. He was fishing on
the Rogue River when an object zipped across the sky and behind a hill.
Now, as then, the sight startled O'Grady, who says he's "semi-retired."

"I was looking up the fairway and I saw something coming straight at
us," said O'Grady, who thought the object fell somewhere near Shady
Cove. "I made a good second shot, though."

Pugh said O'Grady's description of the object indicated it was closer to
Medford than Portland. A fireball is defined as a meteor that glows
brighter than the planet Venus, according to Pugh's meteorites.pdx.edu
Web site.

"We would like to talk to anybody who saw it from your area," he said,
noting the blue tinge was significant. "You're getting the bigger end of
it."

Call Pugh at 503-287-6733 to report fireball sightings.