[meteorite-list] New, long, Carancas article II

[Sterling K. Webb]

Hi, Doug,

> to Schultz's credit, he has put 
> a novel mechanism on the table...

Not only a novel mechanism but an unnecessary one.
This is just what Wild Bill Occam called "multiplying
entities without necessity."

And by your next Post, you'd noticed the gigantic Fly
in the Ointment when you asked: 

> "Why don't other stony meteorites with 
> TKW's over a ton do the same thing?"

In fact, there's a key word missing in that question:
"Why don't ALL other stony meteorites with TKW's 
over a ton do the same thing?"

[Scribble, scribble...] If they all did, we would have
a Carancas-crater event roughly every three weeks.
(That's 170 fresh 10-meter craters since 1998.)


Sterling K. Webb
--------------------------------------------------------------
----- Original Message ----- 
From: <mexicodoug at aim.com>
To: <meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com>
Sent: Saturday, April 05, 2008 11:26 AM
Subject: Re: [meteorite-list] New, long, Carancas article II


Sterling W. wrote:

"Both Schultz and I calculate that the object was still supersonic when 
it hit, still enclosed in a "detached" shock wave, so the sides never 
ablated at any point."

Hi Sterling,

Yes, but to Schultz's credit, he has put a novel mechanism on the table 
for scientific consideration of these "strange" dynamics and motivated 
the issue of the role of the shock wave IMO to begin with. The oriented 
case as presented by you and many others at that time was an 
extrapolation IMO.

I personally like Schultz' refreshing contribution in the field. I 
would rather call your thoughts the natural control for Schultz' idea, 
and not anything particularly novel in meteoritical circles. While any 
idea will need to be earthshattering :-), which explanation (the basic 
made into a very special case or the spontaneous reorganization and its 
complexity - or csome combination of ideas) at this point best complies 
with Occam's Razor is not obvious to me.

However, no matter how distorted in length vs. width, if we consider 
the object was over a ton, that is still a real lot of surface area to 
survive down to a relatively very thick atmosphere at 4 km above sea 
level at that speed. I don't think the shock wave could have powered 
any deflector shields at the front of the bus - but I'm not qualitfied 
at the moment to comment on that. The shear experienced by the material 
at the front had to be enormous in the last 5-10 kilometers.

So this Schultz theory sounds good and a welcomed addition to 
consideration vs. the highly oriented case.

Sterling - do you or does anyone know if the shock veins have been 
shown by the scientists to have been caused upon impact with Earth?

Best wishes and Great Health,
Doug