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ASTRONOMY EXPERTS HAVE said that parts of a meteorite seen streaking across the sky last night could have landed on earth.
The fireball was seen across parts of the country at around 8.15pm, when it lit up the sky for several seconds.
The explosion was most likely caused by a space rock colliding with earth, according to David Moore of Astronomy Ireland.
“No man-made explosion – except for a nuclear weapon being detonated – could have caused a flash this bright,” he said.
Valuable
Moore added: “From a flash this bright, it is possible that part of the rock survived the re-entry process and landed on earth.”
He encouraged people who saw the event to report sightings on the Astronomy Ireland website, www.astronomy.ie, so that others can search the area for meteorites.
“A fireball in November 1999 that dropped a meteorite on Ireland was found in county Carlow after a similar analysis by Astronomy Ireland,” Moore said.
Collectors were later selling bits of this meteorite for 50 times the price of gold at the time, so meteorites can be very valuable.
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Nah, it was lashing
I don’t know what all the panic is about, it was just the Kenny shuttle. https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=691768187625804&id=100003778889124
Astronomy Ireland thinks the meteorite was caused by a “Space rock”. Maybe get someone from one of the universities next time for a comment.
“The explosion was most likely caused by a space rock colliding with earth” doubt that I suspect the explosion was caused by a meteor burning up as it entered the earth’s atmosphere…..
If there had been a collision I think we might have all noticed.
It was the trophy laden Dundalk FC team bus heading back up the M1.
Seen it over Kildare town, amazing!!
Know another thing that’s amazing?
Proper grammar.
You find proper grammar amazing? I’d say you just find it confusing.
Here here tommy
Where, where, Eugene?
I didn’t see it but it did sound like the apocalypse out there.
I saw it last night looking out over Killiney Bay. All of a sudden the place lit up and it was a giant fireball that left a trail behind it for behind it for a while. Knew it was unusual when people in the UK started tweeting the police about it!
It was just an early fragment of the massive group of meteors that killed the dinosaurs.
It won’t be long before the remaining four 50-mile wide remnants make landfall on each continent and plunge the earth into a dark new Ice Age for 500 – 1000 years.
I hope the Government call out the army to protect the ATMs.
It’ll be grand. Sure we have Enda as commander and chief.
I saw something similar on Saturday night, South Kildare, two in a row, breaking into smaller pieces.
Maybe that’s why I had a crap sleep then.
I saw on on Saturday night sometime around 8pm in north Wexford. It was like a shooting star but much bigger
Large meteorites have a tendency to explode as they hit the denser air in the lower atmosphere. The heat and pressure created by their velocity is concentrated on the incoming face and the pressure /thermal shock causes a massive explosion. Much larger ones with a high iron content are better able to hit terra Firma intact and then you have a problem. Despite assurance from the scientific community we really have little or no idea where or when the next big one will hit.
We saw this driving back to Dublin on the n3 yesterday eve. It was ridiculously bright and looked quite low in the air.
Saw it in Virginia had lights on outside was so bright like a massive rocket exploding with loud bang in the sky spectacular.
Was it an Uber shooting star lol.
Colliding with earth!… I think we’d know about something like that!
David Moore of Astronomy Ireland says it is likely the ‘space rock survived re-entry and landed on earth’. For it to be a ‘re-entry’ it would have had to come from Earth originally (like an earth-launched spacecraft. Don’t think space rocks come from earth but I’m not an astronomer!
I was minutes away from seeing it. Just finished walking the pitch dark ring-road at 08:12. At 815 I was sitting in my car under street-lighting. No chance. If I’d been delayed be 5 mins, I’d have had a perfect view.
Would Astronomy Ireland mind explaining what a “space rock” is ? I’ve never heard of this, is I’d some newly discovered entity?
It was Santa doing a dry run test.
US Navy missile test?
have your say