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Re: (meteorobs) -19 MagitUDE?!



In a message dated 07/06/1999 9:34:16 PM Eastern Daylight Time, 
rmn@aaocbn.aao.gov.au writes:

<< I'm not sure what the maximum possible apparent magnitude of a fireball
 might be, but a 100 metre asteroid seen from several kms distance would
 considerably outshine the Sun. >>

Let's not forget the famous "Grand Tetons Fireball" of August 1972.  That 
object actually entered the upper layers of the Earth's atmosphere and then 
skipped back out into space (like a flat stone skipping across a pond).  This 
object was seen by many in broad daylight and there was even a 8mm. film of 
the object skirting above the Tetons.  Some suggest that the weight of this 
object was in the thousands of tons (!) and its brightness was estimated by 
reliable eyewitnesses as somewhere between -19 and -25.  

-- joe rao 
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