Mike's Astro Photos

Most of this weeks episode of Meteorite Men will be about the West Texas / Ash Creek meteorite search, but they will have a segment dedicated to the PA Fireball from July 6th, 2010. Any meteorite hunters out there tracking the Lancaster Meteorites will get a jolt of motivation from watching this episode. It should also be a fun and interesting episode for anyone who experienced the fall last summer. Check it out on Science Channel at 9:00 PM & 11:00 PM this Wednesday night.

Update Tuesday Feb 23, 2010: I got a call from the meteorite men producers and they said they bumped the Mason Dixon segment from the show in favor of a longer Lorton episode.

Tucson Gem & Mineral Show - February 2010

I really wanted to do something special for my wife this Valentines day and I thought, what would be better than a trip to Tucson for the annual Gem & Mineral Show? Exhibitors from around the world converge on Tucson each year show casing the best collections of precious and semi-precious stones, minerals, fossils and other collectibles. This trade show spans dozens of hotels throughout the city and is the home of the world’s largest meteorite expo! I knew she would love it. We arrived Thursday February 4th and were planning a long weekend. Due to the cataclysmic snow storms on the east coast we ended up getting stranded in Tucson for two extra days. We were set to fly back to Dulles on Tuesday and our flight was canceled again as a result of snow storm #2. So we booked a flight to Charlotte NC, rented a 4×4 and planned to drive 8 hours home, through the snow storm. Our luck changed at the Dallas Fort Worth Airport when a plane to Philly was delayed. We were able to jump on that flight and make it home before the snow hit. Now I’m home and looking out the window at 4+ feet of snow on the ground. Its a stark contrast to the sunny 70 degree weather in the west.

Despite the travel chaos the trip to Tucson was a lot of fun. Its a beautiful city and the people are very nice and laid back. I was able to pick up a bunch of nice new meteorites on the cheap and I met up with some of the top meteorite people in the world. I even got a chance to go meteorite hunting in the Wet Stone strewn field. We didn’t find anything but it was a great experience to hunt with pros in the Arizona desert. Here are a few pics of some of the fossils they had at the show. I could have picked up a nice, real, full Triceratops skull for only $250,000, but I didn’t bring that much cash with me.

Tucson Fossil & Meteorite Show - February 2010

T-Rex Skull

Giant Sloth Fossil

Tucson Fossil Show - February 2010

Tucson Fossil Show - February 2010

Tucson Fossil Show - February 2010

Megalodon Jaws

It turns out the Doctors who gave the Lorton Meteorite to the Smithsonian didn’t own the building that got hit and after finding out about it the landlords (the legal owners of the rock) want the meteorite back. The museum offered to pay the landlords $5,000. Turns out the rock is worth $25,000-$50,000. A 300 gram rock at $30 per gram (the low end price for something like this) would be $9,000, at $100 per gram (the super hype price) that would be $30,000 + the hammer stone bonus, first stone in a witnessed fall in the nations capital bonus and all the media hype some bidders might be willing to pay up to $50,000 for this rock. You can read the full article here or watch this update from the local news.

Aerospace engineer and meteor scientist Rob Matson has taken a first crack at an estimated strewnfield for the Lorton meteorite. Since no video of the event has yet been released, Rob used multiple witness reports, radar data, the hammer stone location and wind speed information to plot the possible locations for other meteorites from this fall. Rob has stressed the importance of searching within a 1 mile radius of the Dr’s office first but has provided this additional information should those search areas become exhausted. One should not interpret these coordinates in an x-marks-the-spot type of way. They should serve more as a general guide to areas where different sized stones would be if they existed. The strategy Rob suggested was drawing a line between the dots and covering those areas, but only after exhausting the areas around the Dr’s office.

Here is a map of the coordinates plotted in Google Earth.

Lorton Meteorite - Estimated Strewnfield v1

Here is a copy of the Google Earth KMZ file for the Lorton Meteorite Estimated Strewnfield. You will need Google Earth installed on your computer in order to view this file.

Here are the raw data coordinates for the various masses:

Mass    Longitude  Latitude  Dist (mi) Bearing
——-  ———  ——–  ——— ——-
3 g    -77.12929  38.73888     5.2      59.3
5 g    -77.14419  38.73268     4.3      58.7
15 g    -77.16179  38.72688     3.2      56.0
40 g    -77.18079  38.71908     2.1      52.6
120 g    -77.19569  38.71088     1.1      50.6
(308 g)  -77.21159  38.70068     -0-      N/A
1150 g   -77.22609  38.69048     1.1     228.0
3750 g   -77.24249  38.67848     2.3     227.4

It looks like one of the points is on the driving range of the Fort Belvoir Golf Course. That would be a nice easy place to search if you had access.

Meteorite Hunting on Fort Belvoir Golf Course

There have been no new discoveries reported.

If you are a local resident in the Lorton area you are encouraged to be on the lookout for meteorites. Should you find one, please record the exact location where it was found and contact me at mike.hankey [AT] gmail.com

On Monday January 18th at approximately 5:40 PM a huge fireball streaked the skies above PA, MD and VA. A piece of it ripped a hole through the roof of a Dentist’s office (this is called a hammer stone). Witness reports indicate fragmentation and numerous illuminated timbers falling to the ground. There are definitely more stones to be found and we’ve got a really good idea where they are. Meteorite hunting really doesn’t get better than this.

During the Geminid meteor shower I took over 1,000 photos. When reviewing the pictures you basically have to step through each pic looking for meteors. As you skip through pictures you see the stars move and sometimes you will see something that wasn’t there before. I noticed something over a series of 40 pictures at 30 seconds each, a total of 20 minutes. I thought it was a satellite a first, but after review I noticed it stayed in the field of view for 20 minutes but most of the satellites I’ve photographed before only lasted for 30 seconds or less. So I guessed this was probably a slow moving high orbit satellite. I thought it would have been cool if this was a comet or an asteroid or an alien UFO, but I asked around and my initial suspicions were confirmed. This is most likely a HEO satellites (HEO=Highly Elliptical Orbit: aka ‘Molniya’ orbits) or a geosynchronous satellite. I’m still working on an official ID. It would be nice if one of these times I would catch an actual alien mothership.

Satellite Astrophoto

Satellite Astrophoto

Satellite Astrophoto

Here is the full photo of the picture. Can you see the satellite streak? (hint: lower left, to the left of Sirius).

Satellite Astrophoto - Can you find it?

UPDATE: Jan 5th, 2009:
Marco Langbroek from SatCamTracking was able to identify this satellite as a Russian GLONASS navigation satellite. Here’s what Marco had to say:

It is Kosmos 1948 (88-043C), a Russian GLONASS navigation satellite launched in 1988. GLONASS is the Russian equivalent of the American GPS. They move in orbits with a revolution period of two revolutions/day, at roughly 19000 km altitude (that’s some 12000 miles).

Today marks the end of the International Year of Astronomy a ‘global effort initiated to help the citizens of the world rediscover their place in the Universe through the day – and night-time sky’. It is coincidental that I purchased my first telescope at celestron.com on December 27th, 2008 without knowing anything about the IYA project or the 400 year anniversary of Galileo’s discovery. Looking back at that time compared to now, I feel I was naive, ignorant and lost in regard to my place in the Universe and while I am still naive, ignorant and lost in the face of the Universe I am light years away from where I was then.

At this time last year I was eagerly awaiting the arrival of my first telescope. I didn’t know anything. I had never seen the craters of the moon up close, was never amazed by the rings of Saturn, and had never gazed upon Orion’s nebula. I knew what tracking was, but I didn’t understand how it worked, the concept of polar alignment was completely foreign and I thought GOTO would do exactly that all the time with no effort. I had never owned a DSLR camera and did not know what an auto-guider was. I knew I could hook up my telescope and camera to my computer but I didn’t know why I would want to. At that time I could only identify one or two constellations and that’s about it. Until July 6th, 2009 I had never even thought about meteor observing and I didn’t even understand the difference between meteors and meteorites. Sometimes people ask me why I got into astronomy. There are a lot of reasons, but the catalyst for buying my first telescope and wanting to start astrophotography was an emoticon in the sky created by Jupiter, Venus and the crescent moon — a sad face on December 1st, 2008.

I remember setting up the telescope in the solarium and gazing out the window at Orion’s nebula for the first time. I was totally amazed by the way it looked and so proud of myself that I had located it manually with no tracking or GOTO navigation. I started taking pictures about a month later and things got a lot more complicated, difficult and rewarding. When you are visually observing and not photographing you really can’t see very much when it comes to deep space objects like galaxies and faint nebula. The human eye can only process light for a millisecond while the camera gathers light for minutes or hours. As a result you can see a lot more stuff in an astrophoto than you can in the eye piece of a telescope. I was so excited by the first pictures of galaxies I was able to take. To image light millions of years old from objects that are light years wide and millions of light years away is simply mind blowing.

By March I had the rest of my year planned out. I was going to build an observatory and focus the rest of the years efforts on imaging galaxies and nebula. That was the plan until July when I accidentally took a picture of a bolide meteor while imaging the Andromeda Galaxy. That meteor changed a lot for me and set me on a new course. Instead of looking up at the sky for enormous objects light years away I was going to start looking down for tiny little objects 50 miles from my house. I spent the rest of the year tracking the meteor and searching for its remains. I really felt that the Universe was telling me to look for these meteorites for a reason and I thought that reason was to find some space rocks. At the end of the year looking back and having found no meteorites I am still very happy I had the experience. I have learned and grown in ways I would have never expected and I have a new respect for the Universe and my place in it. Who would have thought a sad face in the sky would have brought so much happiness and a year of astronomy like this.

Here’s a picture of the winning field goal kick from last nights Ravens vs Steelers game in Baltimore. Man it is nice to start the week out with a victory over Pittsburgh. HURA!

Ravens vs Steelers - November 29th, 2009

There was big news in the meteorite community last week when a huge bolide was seen exploding over Utah. Multiple cameras caught the meteor as it burst in the skies. Below is a compilation video from youtube that shows the sight from four different security videos.

After a week of gathering information and plotting the trajectory, senior scientist and meteor trajectory expert Rob Matson has estimated the meteorites from this fall have landed inside a secret US military base the size of Rhode Island called Dugway Proving Grounds. The US Army claims to use this gigantic base to test chemical, biological and radioactive weapons and says they have blown up thousands of bombs in the area (and continue to do so). The base is considered so dangerous large parts of it are off limits even to Army personnel. UFO theorists call the base Area 52, in large part because of the UFO sightings that have been reported over or around it. Rumor has it the Roswell UFO wreckage and government alien research program was transferred from Area 51 to the Dugway Proving Ground after its cover was blown in the 1950s.

Here’s what the US General Accounting Office has to say about Dugway Proving Grounds:

“Dugway Proving Ground is a military testing facility located approximately 80 miles southwest of Salt Lake City. For several decades, Dugway has been the site of testing for various chemical and biological agents. From 1951 through 1969, hundreds, perhaps thousands of open-air tests using bacteria and viruses that cause disease in human, animals, and plants were conducted at Dugway… It is unknown how many people in the surrounding vicinity were also exposed to potentially harmful agents used in open-air tests at Dugway.”

Dave Rosenfeld, president of Utah UFO Hunters, has this to say about Dugway:

“Numerous UFOs have been seen and reported in the area in and around Dugway…[military aircraft can't account for] all the unknowns seen in the area. It might be that our star visitors are keeping an eye on Dugway too…[Dugway is] the new area 51. And probably the new military spaceport.”

The new military spaceport? So maybe that wasn’t a meteor after all…

Mike with some Jawas

My in-laws gave me tickets to Starwars In Concert as an early Christmas present. The show was amazing and like nothing I have ever seen before. Anothony Daniels (C3p0) was the host and it was a thrill to see him in person. We had great seats so close to the stage I could easily have pegged Daniels with a thermal detonator.

The music was performed by a live symphony orchestra while a cleverly edited remix of the movies played on screen behind the stage. Each song was centered around a specific character, event or theme and Daniels introduced each song by telling a story about the character or event. The video footage playing during the song was a cut and mix of conceptual art and footage from all 6 of the films. It was a very stimulating and interesting way to see Star Wars and by the end of the show it felt like you had watched the entire saga in a little under two hours. I was reminded by Daniels that the ‘odds of successfully navigating an asteroid belt are approximately 3720 to 1′. I think finding a piece of an asteroid in Lancaster are slightly worse than that.

Props from the original movies apparently taken from George Lucas’s private collection at the Skywalker Ranch were setup throughout the concorse. It was a great display with all of the usual suspects and well over 20 exhibits. Live characters from a Star Wars fan club walked around the halls in full costumes. The costumes were great and the club was well prepared. There were no-duplicate characters present (except for storm troopers) and all characters were well represented.

Visit the Star Wars in Concert website to check show times and watch some videos. The tour is about 1/2 over but there are still available dates. If its in your area, I highly recommend it. Even the non-star-wars-fan would be impressed.

Thanks to my in-law’s connections at Lucas Film, I got VIP tickets and was able to access the show a couple of hours early. This let us look at the exhibits before the crowds arrived and we even got to watch the orchestra warm up a little. Here are some pictures from the show.

Jedi Master Yoda

Tusken Raider

Storm Troopers

X-Wing Pilot

Jedi Couple

Darth Vader Fighting Youngling

Mike With Chewbaca

C3P0 - Human Cyborg Relations

Anthony Daniels on Stage

Wife Getting Force Choked

Original Score - Written In Pencil!

Here’s are a few quick video clips I took before and during the show:

Who says aliens and UFOs don’t exist?

Mike with Alien & UFO

Here is a pretty cool space video a friend sent me:

We Are All Connected – Watch more Funny Videos

Fake Meteor Crater In Latvia

A report about a 20 meter meteor crater and burning meteorite came out Sunday night. Minutes after the report surfaced meteorite experts called foul.

Today scientists have reported that the crater was man made and concluded this was not caused by a meteor and must be some sort of hoax.

Possible non meteor explanations include:

1) Publicity stunt to increase tourism perpetrated by Borat and the Latvian Government
2) Russian weapons test gone bad
3) Underground natural gas explosion
4) Latest experiment from balloon boy’s dad

At this point most news organizations outside are reporting this as a hoax. The people who created / reported the incident made a pretty cool video though.

The Mars Rover has found another big meteorite on Mars. Interesting article with some great pictures:

http://www.spaceflightnow.com/news/n0910/11meteorite/

I have to do a lot of shadow analysis with all of these new videos so I went googling and found this program written by someone at MIT.

http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/g8rghr/297509

It has been pretty useful conceputally interpreting the shadows. We will need percise measurements of the shadows in order to get anything tangible out of the shadow videos.