

Asteroid the 'Size of a Minivan' Exploded over California - pwg
http://news.discovery.com/space/meteor-the-size-of-a-minivan-exploded-over-california-120423.html

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jklp
It looks like Scott Adams was lucky enough to see this asteroid too!

<http://www.dilbert.com/blog/entry/gods_matchbox/>

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gulbrandr
For the author of this blog post:

    
    
      font-size: 16px;
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Random_Person
I'm not a fan of using kilotons of TNT as a scale. The average reader has no
frame of reference for this measurement.

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jeza
You're right. They should use terajoules. :)

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Random_Person
Heh.

I was going to suggest a percentage of Hiroshima explosion, but I realize this
is a sensitive subject. It bothers me, however, when articles describe an
explosion as "X kilos of TNT" and follow that up with "approximately X atom
bombs that were dropped on Hiroshima." The Hiroshima part is likely what most
readers will relate with.

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evoxed
Granting the high level of speculation involved, but with any frequency
wouldn't these sorts of things be quite the wildfire hazard? Or is the impact
and subsequent disintegration and boring of the object negate any heat/fire?
Yes, I'm clueless.

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WettowelReactor
They dont have enough heat to start fires generally. They are cold from their
travel through space and the outer layer that does heat up on reentry tends to
ablate leaving a core that is cold to warm on impact.

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sparknlaunch12
This happens all the time. Only a matter of time until one big enough land on
earths surface.

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m0skit0
For me, Discovery is not a reliable source for science news. Way too much...
sensationalist, to say the least.

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Tichy
Must be Google's fault. I thought they would be more careful with their mining
operation.

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Tomis02
Quite disturbing that there was no warning of this.

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ars
It was a pretty small meteor as these things go. They are virtually impossible
to detect ahead of time.

But since it's small, it's also not dangerous. The dangerous ones are larger -
and also easier to see. So that works out in our favor.

