[meteorite-list] meteoroid question

lebofsky at lpl.arizona.edu lebofsky at lpl.arizona.edu
Sun Oct 4 22:51:55 EDT 2009


Hi all:

I am involved with a teacher professional development workshop this week
and the teachers give us questions that they hope we can answer for them.
I am fine with most of them (such is Pluto a planet?), but I figured that,
before I give them a partially correct answer, I would ask the experts out
there for their responses:

What is the rate at which things burn up when they enter Earth’s atmosphere?

About how much material is burned up (mass per unit time)?

Along that same idea, for a "typical" chondritic meteoroid, what is the
minimum size that you might expect to make it through the atmosphere and
land as a meteorite? Ballpark is fine since, clearly there are many
factors involved (initial velocity, angle of entry, material strength
etc.).

Thanks in advance.

Larry




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