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Has anybody else Heard a Meteor ?

Polar Bear

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Polar Bear

Polar Bear

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Back in 2007 I was staying at a cottage near Kilbride on the Isle of Skye. I was not really into observing back then being more of an armchair astronomer.

At about 01.30 on a clear , silent night , I was having a cigarette outside the cottage when both my partner and myself witnessed a fireball due South that tracked West to East for about 4 - 5 seconds, and we both simultaneously heard a crackling sound.

I understand the physics and was very doubtful that the two were connected but have just read an excellent book by Martin Beech on Meteors and Meteorites (ISBN 1 86126 825-4) in which he says this could be caused by the ionized tail and the Earth's magnetic field interacting where the tail produces VLF radio waves that interact with objects and vegetation near to the observer.

Just wondered if anyone else had experienced this ? I feel very privileged to have witnessed it.

Paul

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Altair

Altair

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yes i can vouch for hearing one ..

when i was in my teens i was just outside back door when i heard whooshing sound behind me in the sky - I looked around to see this amazing fireball and before i could say Hey mum come look at this ! it had vanished.. it was moving so fast and so bright west to east and i have never seen one since!

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Beulah

Beulah

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yes i can vouch for hearing one ..

when i was in my teens i was just outside back door when i heard whooshing sound behind me in the sky - I looked around to see this amazing fireball and before i could say Hey mum come look at this ! it had vanished.. it was moving so fast and so bright west to east and i have never seen one since!

So you heard it before you saw it? :blob10:

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Doug

Doug

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Paul,

You are not along I had seen and heard a meteor pass by going North to South whilst observing I got really excited and the smoke trail was great

I used to keep times and directions on bits for paper of me sittings and just stopped doing it

the more I observe the more I see

Happy hunting

Doug

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Altair

Altair

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So you heard it before you saw it? :blob10:

yes Sam I heard it first.. and then turned to see what it was.. i know it was still early evening just after dusk..never forget it!:)

and it left a huge trail behind it which lasted for about 7 seconds

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Stu

Stu

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Would the sound not come much after actually seeing the meteor? I went to a lecture at Guildford the other week with Dr John Mason on meteors and his comment was that if you see a fireball, you should wait around several minutes and see if you hear it. Given that most meteors burn up very high in the atmosphere (100 miles ish??) then the sound would take quite a while to arrive....

I guess it all depends on what height they burn up at

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Altair

Altair

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the one i saw and heard was BIG a large fireball... still burning up and not as high as normal meteors i even at the time wondered if any fragments hit the ground... i tell you - it kept me looking for more for months!! At that time we didnt have the internet to report sightings i am talking about the late *60s when i was just about 14 at the time..but i knew what i saw as i used to observe meteor showers ... so was used to seeing them and this was nothing like them!

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Polar Bear

Polar Bear

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Great to know I am not alone on this one. With regard to the mention of time lag , what you hear is not the actual sound of the Meteor but it creating Very Low Frequency radio waves by interaction of its ionised tail with the Earth's magnetic field and these VLF radio waves physically interacting with the surroundings. So you hear it ( so as to speak) simultaneously.

What you hear varies from Meteor to Meteor , person to person and what your surroundings are. Most of the time there is probably too much background noise to notice this phenomenon and we only noticed it by being in a very quiet area (Skye) Plus it seems only large 'Fireball' type Meteors create the radio waves so it must be tied in with the amount of energy released.

The other thread ties in with all this, cheers for sharing. I have borrowed the link to a better explanation than mine....http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2001/ast26nov_1/

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Talitha

Talitha

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The only time i ever heard one was during a semi-cloudy Leonid shower. There was a really bright (travelling) flash behind a thin cloud, accompanied by a very loud 'boom'... i'm assuming it was a bolide, sure wish i could have seen it. :blob10:

...about a guy who records the sounds of the earths electiical and magnetic signals.

Sarah, thanks so much for the youtube link, i didn't know Mr. McGreevy had anything in there. He's been recording these sounds for quite a long time... here's a page i bookmarked a number of years ago with loads of great sounds: Stephen P. McGreevy's ground-based ELF-VLF recordings

And here's another one of his sites: Auroralchorus

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Altair

Altair

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Todays news story heard on radio this morning...

Fireball destroys over 50 homes south of San Francisco.... I wonder if they heard that one coming?

Oh they now say the fireball was caused by a gas explosion .. not the sort of fireballs we were discussing here!

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Smooth

Smooth

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In 1987 I was in my back garden (at the time we were living in a rural area so nice and dark) and was using an old 17th century brass refractor my grandmother let me borrow. It was sitting on top of wooden stepladders for a stable base. It was frosty, and our cat kept climbing the steps and purring loudly, rubbing its face on my hands.

I was used to seeing meteors, but what happened next made me jump. I stepped down the ladder holding the cat. When I looked back up, there was a very long trail forming, from my west to east, with a bright white, turning to orange meteor at the front, and it was breaking up, and all of a sudden heard a whooshing sound, then a sonic boom. This all happened within about 3 seconds as it was moving so fast.

I've seen hundreds of meteors since then, none of which have been as bright, or loud. I was told that i'd seen a bollide.

Anyway, an experience i'll never forget. :blob10:

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Worzsel

Worzsel

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No problem Carol :blob10:

Thank you for the links to the his other sites. I am going to enjoy hunting out more recordings of that beautiful sound.. isn't it amazing!

I am sorry for the state of my first post, I had my son clambering around on my lap..

www.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3DeHvdZdsIZxg

^^ that is the link to it again.. I've just realised my first link didn't work without a bit of jiggery pokery.

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  • 5 months later...
nightvision

nightvision

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Yes, back in the early 1970's heard (or felt?) something like a faint hiss and crackle, couldn't be sound as it happen as I saw the meteor so I figured it was some kind of RF or EM discharge. I worked with high power transmission technologies so that conclusion made some sense.

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