Starship Asterisk*

The capital of Nicaragua, Managua, has been hit by a meteorite.

The link in question also talks about asteroid 2014 RC, which will pass (will hav e passed?) over the Earth at a distance only a tenth of the distance between the Earth and the Moon, or 40,000 kilometers.

Ann

Ann wrote:The capital of Nicaragua, Managua, has been hit by a meteorite.

The link in question also talks about asteroid 2014 RC, which will pass (will hav e passed?) over the Earth at a distance only a tenth of the distance between the Earth and the Moon, or 40,000 kilometers.

I'm extremely skeptical that the crater was caused by an impact, and even more skeptical that it would have been related to 2014 RC.

I was similarly skeptical about it coming from 2014 RC. What, did someone kick a chunk off while it was passing? I can't say as much for the crater. Don't you need a closer look to make that determination or is this small photo really that atypical for a meteor crater?

geckzilla wrote:I was similarly skeptical about it coming from 2014 RC. What, did someone kick a chunk off while it was passing? I can't say as much for the crater. Don't you need a closer look to make that determination or is this small photo really that atypical for a meteor crater?

A crater that size almost certainly suggests a body that would produce a huge daytime fireball that would be witnessed by thousands, major sonic booms, seismic activity, infrasound, etc. I haven't heard any reports of any of that. A meteorite isn't out of the question, but some sort of explosion on the ground seems much more likely.

We'll see.

Oh, I see. Details are pretty sketchy for now to say the least.

The SMH article does mention recorded seismic activity and witness accounts of the sound and sight of an explosion on the ground. But yes, very odd that there was no mention of a fireball through the sky, especially in a populated area near an airport. Could have been some kind of military exercise/accident/cover-up/diversion/hoax, I suppose.

Nitpicker wrote:The SMH article does mention recorded seismic activity and witness accounts of the sound and sight of an explosion on the ground. But yes, very odd that there was no mention of a fireball through the sky, especially in a populated area near an airport. Could have been some kind of military exercise/accident/cover-up/diversion/hoax, I suppose.

A ground explosion would still produce local seismics. But a typical large fireball dropping meteorites (let alone producing a crater) would generate them over a path hundreds of kilometers long.