PLEASE NOTE:
*
Subject:
Fire caused by meteorite in Netherlands?
To:
cambridge-conference@livjm.ac.uk (Cambridge Conference)
Date sent: Tue, 26 Aug
1997 00:10:26 -0500 (CDT)
From:
pib@nwu.edu
I quote the following comments by Arie Nouwen which appeared
in a message in
alt.sci.planetary on August 7, 1997. I haven't been able to
find any
further information about this purported impact event. It
sounds to me like
a possible observation of a fireball and an unrelated fire.
"Today I saw in an article in the
local newspaper
'De Dordtenaar' (region of Dordrecht in
The Netherlands) a news report
about a meteorite that would have caused
a fire in a municipal shipyard
in the city of Gorinchem, also in the
Netherlands. This happened on
august 5th 1997. According to the
reporter of the article, Anja
Broeken, a police officer saw a very
bright, spherical light. He was
driving in his car on the A15, a
national roadway. The light was as big
as a football and it moved in a straight
line. Other citizens also saw
'very bright objects crossing the sky'.
At 22h27m MEZT (Middle European
Summer Time) the fire brigade of
Gorinchem received a message that
there was a fire at the local
shipyard. When the fire brigade arrived
a pile of natural waste, 5 meters high,
was burning. An information
service officer of the police, G.Herwig,
declared in the article that
there is another explanation for the
fire. He says that last week
public workers had burned wood that was
infected with the elm disease.
The afterburning of this can last for
several days and perhaps sparks
of the wood had caused the fire."
The web page of the Dutch Meteor Society at
http://home.pi.net/~terkuile/meteors/dms.htm
notes that bright meteors of magnitude -3 and -5 were observed
in
The Netherlands. In particular, at 23:23:30 UT (which I
believe would
correspond to 22:23:30 MEZT -- correction welcome!) an observer
reported a
mag. -3 Perseid in Pegasus, and at 23:28:20 a Capricornid in
Aquila with
flares at mag -5.
Phil "Pib" Burns
Northwestern University, Evanston, IL. USA
pib@nwu.edu
http://pibweb.it.nwu.edu/~pib/