Fireball Activity Increases Dramatically Over the Last Two Years

[John Keefer]

Fireball Activity Increases Dramatically Over the Last Two Years


Fireballs are always spectacular when we can glimpse them as they burn through the atmosphere. But according to some recently collated data, they are becoming more and more common.

It's Armageddon, people. Fire and brimstone falling from the sky. It's the end of the world! Ok, melodrama aside, it appears there has been a significant increase in the numbers of fireballs being recorded entering the Earth's atmosphere from 2013 to present.

According to data collated by Dr. M.A. Rose and NASA's All-Sky Fireball Network [http://www.sott.net/article/309988-NASA-space-data-supports-citizens-observations-Meteor-fireballs-are-increasing-dramatically].

Among the findings:


From mid-2010, the average number of fireballs significantly increased, until late 2015 when the rolling average stabilized.
Fireball frequency is most concentrated in the months August to December. However, the numbers for June and July are also increasing significantly, suggesting that the area of space from which asteroid and comet debris is reaching Earth is increasing in size.
There has been a consistent increase in asteroid numbers from 1998-2013, and significant increases for 2014 and 2015, which shadows the big increases in fireballs observed over those two years.


The report also looks at Near Earth Asteroids and the larger number of asteroids being captured as moons by the gravity of Saturn and Jupiter, as well as the number of fireballs caused by meteor showers. He notes that most fireballs are classified as "sporadics" meaning that they aren't associated with any particular shower or comet debris.

Rose speculates that a couple things may be occurring: A brown dwarf companion to the sun in a large elliptical orbit is spewing more debris into the inner solar system, although no dwarf has yet been found (the Nemesis hypothesis), and/or giant comets from the trans-Neptune region (known as Centaurs) are being displaced and disintegrating, causing the increased fireball activity (the Napier et al paper [http://astrogeo.oxfordjournals.org/content/56/6/6.24.abstract?sid=867317c0-23aa-44ae-acd7-c681b4680530]). In the latter, he quotes "All three major 20th-century impacts (Tunguska, British Guiana, Curuca River) coincided with our passage through major meteoroid streams (respectively, the Beta Taurids, Geminids and Perseids)," noting a dramatic increase in the number of fireballs from the Perseids and Northern Taurids.

Check out the gallery below for all of the charts that Rose included, and read all of his conclusions at the Signs of the Times site [http://www.sott.net/article/309988-NASA-space-data-supports-citizens-observations-Meteor-fireballs-are-increasing-dramatically]. Whether you believe Armageddon is coming or not, the findings are interesting. Start watching the skies for more fireballs.

[gallery=5401]

Source: Signs of the Times [http://www.sott.net/article/309988-NASA-space-data-supports-citizens-observations-Meteor-fireballs-are-increasing-dramatically]



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[Lightknight]

It looks like the correlation more closely follows smart phone and internet adoption. If the data is influenced by reports of fireballs moreso than some sort of network that identifies these things automatically then I'd say we're just looking at a greater trend in reporting such events.

Since they're saying that the fireballs don't appear to correspond with the near earth objects then I could pretty easily believe this to be report-driven. I'm not seeing anything on how they monitor fireball occurrences otherwise.

 

[RandV80]

They all seem to be hitting Russia, and none of the Russian's filming it seem surprised. Coincidence!?

 

[Cowabungaa]

Maybe an alternate explanation could be space debris coming back to Earth? Then again, seeing as this research is done in conjunction with data from NASA you'd think they'd have taken that into account and subsequently ruled out. Seeing as how it's not in the article and all that.

I'm not seeing anything on how they monitor fireball occurrences otherwise.

That isn't true, the article clearly states:

Rose used data from the American Meteor Society and NASA's All-Sky Fireball Network.

I'd reckon (and am sure of the Network) that those don't exactly rely on smartphones.

 

[Albino Boo]

I would like to say that there is a very small base line on fireballs. There is no way of knowing that things are just returning to normal and we have been at a low point. Even 300 years ago fireballs would have gone unrecorded over the vast areas of the world's landmass. So we very little data to say what's normal and what isn't

Maybe an alternate explanation could be space debris coming back to Earth? Then again, seeing as this research is done in conjunction with data from NASA you'd think they'd have taken that into account and subsequently ruled out. Seeing as how it's not in the article and all that.

I'm not seeing anything on how they monitor fireball occurrences otherwise.

That isn't true, the article clearly states:

Rose used data from the American Meteor Society and NASA's All-Sky Fireball Network.

I'd reckon (and am sure of the Network) that those don't exactly rely on smartphones.

Most space debris aren't big enough to cause a fireball and those that are. i.e large satellites are in known orbits which are monitored by early warning radars. During the cold war both sides looked at disguising nuclear warheads as normal satellites which cold be dropped without warning on targets. The soviets put into service a system https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fractional_Orbital_Bombardment_System but it was phased out but large objetcs in orbit remain heavly montitred by anyone capable to be on the safe side.


The American Meteor Society just use web form to report a fireball http://www.amsmeteors.org/members/imo/report_intro . The NASA's All-Sky Fireball Network is just 15 black white cameras with fisheye lenses. http://fireballs.ndc.nasa.gov/

 

[Kaymish]

Im thinking that instead of crazy conspiracy theories we probably just have the same number of fireballs but more people are recording and reporting them just like the cancer rate with Fukushima because we are looking for them with more vigor than normal reported incidences go up

 

[Hevach]

The NASA's All-Sky Fireball Network is just 15 black white cameras with fisheye lenses. http://fireballs.ndc.nasa.gov/

And it was less than this just a few years ago. It was established in 2004, exactly at the point that the chart moves off of 0, with just three. It was expanded progressively from there, with the major expansions in 2009-2010 and 2011-2012 coinciding with abrupt steps up in activity.

As for the American Meteor Society, it's also had a drastic increase in reports, because within the last decade, more and more amateur astronomers have come to own impressive high tech equipment that even professionals didn't have ready access to for decades. At the start of the chart, the AMS's reports were almost all academic and media reports.

But the last few years (incidentally starting around 2011 and becoming especially popular in 2013-2014) the AMS has picked up a lot of well equipped hobbyists. It's now a matter of $100 and an afternoon of work to set up a passive detection system, and an hour or two once a week to filter out all the contrails and helicopters it picks up instead of fireballs. There's dozens of people doing this now, and they account for that last large surge.



Remember folks, you need to correct for increased sample size when doing stuff like this. The chart literally shows the exact pattern you'd expect with the establishment and expansion of professional and later amateur detection systems.

You could go to the DoE/DoD guys who monitor atmospheric nuclear explosions. For the last several decades, their job basically consists of detecting every fireball over a certain size anywhere in the world, saying, "Yep, that's a fireball, not a nuke," and recording the event. They do make data available to academics, and they are frequently sourced for research. For decades that data hasn't shown any increase in activity.

 

[Kahani]

published on SOTT.net

Seriously? This would the sott.net that describes itself as an "alternative" news source, with categories including "puppet masters", "secret history" and "science of the spirit"? You seriously just quoted an article from a site entirely filled with conspiracy theories, aliens and new age bullshit as if it was a real analysis by a sane person? Why not just tell us about the latest double-decker bus that's been discovered on the Moon, or how aliens are hiding evidence of bigfoot using chemtrails?

 

[Lightknight]

Maybe an alternate explanation could be space debris coming back to Earth? Then again, seeing as this research is done in conjunction with data from NASA you'd think they'd have taken that into account and subsequently ruled out. Seeing as how it's not in the article and all that.

I'm not seeing anything on how they monitor fireball occurrences otherwise.

That isn't true, the article clearly states:

Rose used data from the American Meteor Society and NASA's All-Sky Fireball Network.

I'd reckon (and am sure of the Network) that those don't exactly rely on smartphones.

It appears to just be a network of 15 Cameras in the US. It's possible that camera tech and affordability just improved too. It'd be funny if in 2006 there were only 5 cameras and now the number of cameras have increased and improved to be able to capture more. Then it'd explain the correlation with technological improvements in cameras that have lined up almost perfectly with smart phones now that basically everyone carries a camera in their pocket.