[meteorite-list] (Meteorite)Astro Mike's Meteor Photo

[GeoZay at aol.com]

I'm still pondering whether this image is  that of a meteor or not? Besides 
questioning the lack of a hint of the "meteors"  ionized column afterglow 
for a case against the image being a meteor, I got to  thinking about the 
width of the "meteor" itself in the image. That is the  ionized column or trail 
of the meteor. The ionized column is produced from both  the disintegrating 
meteoroid and "the shock and awe" to the atmospheric atoms  and molecules. 
The faster and larger the meteoroid, the wider the ionized  column. I 
understand that we are talking about a fireball here. So I'm thinking  it should 
be big. I think JKelly Beatty came up with a likely dimension estimate  for 
the meteor trail, but I no longer have that message to refer to. So I'm just  
tossing up something that may or may not support his or my case. I've read  
somewhere in the past that the width of the ionized column of a meteor, 
with a  meteoroid the size of a grain of sand is typically in the neighborhood 
of about  a yard or two. Also the width of the ionized column for a rocky 
meteoroid of a  foot in diameter, should be somewhere in the neighborhood of a 
couple hundred  feet. I'm curious as to what the width of the trail is in 
this image, if the  object was about 45 miles above the earth? Unfortunately 
I don't possess the  math skills to figure this out for myself, but I know 
some of you out there do.  If the answer is considerably less than about 200 
feet, I remain even more  against the notion that the image is that of a 
meteor. 

As for in this  detailed photo, it really bugs me to not see a hint of a 
twisting afterglow of  the ionized column...or am I not picking something up 
here? 
GeoZay  

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