The dangerous Orionid

Just hit Reuters. Maybe bring some steel umbrellas for the meteorwatch!
A 1cm meteor did that!

Oct 20, 2006 — BERLIN (Reuters) - A fire that destroyed a cottage near Bonn and injured a 77-year-old man was probably caused by a meteor and witnesses saw an arc of blazing light in the sky, German police said on Friday.

Burkhard Rick, a spokesman for the police in Siegburg east of Bonn, said the fire gutted the cottage and badly burned the man's hands and face in the incident on October 10.

"We sought assistance from Bochum observatory and they noted that at that particular moment the earth was near a field of meteoroid splinter and it could be assumed that particles had entered the atmosphere," he said.

"The particles usually don't reach the surface because they disintegrate in the atmosphere," he added. "But some can make it to the ground. We believe this was a bolide (meteoric fireball) with a size of no more than 10 mm."

I think we'll need more than an umbrella!

If only it landed in my backgarden.

Hmm, I'd be a little suspicious about the culprit in this story.

Meteorites ain't balls of flame as they near the ground ... rock doesn't burn (unless it's lava!)

A piece of space rock reaches terminal velocity at a certain height and will then fall solely under the influence of gravity. It will have slowed down significantly after it enters our atmosphere.

A one-cm size particle is pretty small to start a conflagration. Any meteorite that has been seen to fall is actually only slightly warm to the touch.

It is pretty close to firework season!

atb,

John

The word "arc" gives it away. A meteor would have come down vertically in free fall.

Sounds like a Molotov Coctail.

He probably isn't popular in the neighbourhood.