I’m headed out to the field to the Rob Matson & Marc Fries search area. Wish me luck.

Jupiter and Moon Aug 6th, 2009

It was a pretty clear night tonight. I saw Jupiter hanging out next to the moon and it looked like a good shot. My scope is not currently setup as I’m in the middle of construction on a new observatory, so I just snapped this pic with the tripod and camera lens.

I’ve spent most of my meteor time this week prepping for this weekend. I’ve reviewed and recorded all of the streets that cross the path. I found the PA land record website and with a little creative searching I’ve been able to get all of the property records for all of the potential estates. There aren’t that many of them, <30 tops. The records show pictures of the houses, acreage and obviously the property owners names.

I’m manipulating this data and prioritizing the targets and preparing a field agenda. I’ve found that lack of preparation before the field visits results in a lot of wasted time and effort. This weekend priority #1 will be making contact with as many land owners as possible the goal being to get permission to search the land.

I bought a hand held hikers GPS and I’m putting in coordinates of the high value targets. I’ve also teamed up with two different groups of meteorite hunters and we are coordinating our efforts and working together.  I am also working with a group of friends so that while I’m off talking to land owners they are searching the streets and public areas.

I got this report from Gary, a Carrol County resident, a few days ago:

“On July 26, 2009 I found an unusual rock lying on top of some mulch in my parent’s yard in north-central Maryland (Carroll County).  It is totally unlike anything in the area.  It looks like a meteorite to me.  It is gray, with irregular shape, indentations which appear to have possibly been made by hot gas, and a few small rusty spots.  The rock is about 2 inches wide.  It is slightly attracted to a strong magnet.   No one in the family had put the rock where it was found.  No digging has occurred recently around where it was found.  The region where this rock was found would be somewhat in line with your projected path of the recent meteor that may have landed near the Susquehanna River.”

I asked Gary to send me some pictures. Here they are:

My first thoughts are this is not a meteorite because:

• Meteorites are usually black with a fusion crust
• Carrol County is pretty far from the trajectory we are currently working with

I’m not a meteorite expert, so I have sent the pictures out to the meteorite community to see what they think. Comments are much appreciated.

Sunday morning I went meteorite hunting in Intercourse, PA with two friends. A lot of the other meteorite hunters have told me they gave up on trying to find the PA fireball because the terrain is too difficult. After surveying the area, it really doesn’t seem that bad. Obviously not as easy as a desert, but thanks to the two new videos we found, the area I’m working with right now is really not that big.  Once the harvest comes, these fields will actually be pretty easy to search.

We setup base camp in a quaint town and the people we met and talked to were very nice and helpful. We tried to stay away from the farmers on this outing as Sunday is the Amish day of rest and we didn’t want to bother them on their holy day. We did speak with some locals who were very helpful. I learned the names of several farmers of interest and plan on returning later. We found a few meteor-wrongs, but unfortunately no meteorites. All the same, we had a great time, learned a lot about the area and will be much more prepared the next time we head out there. We also had some of the best food I’ve had in a while. Jackey’s Amish BBQ is banging! There are a lot of interesting places and people in this part of the country. Here are a few pictures from our adventures in Intercourse.

Intercourse News Aug 2, 2009

Where would you like to go today?

Best BBQ on the East Coast

Under Armour's new product line? (click to enlarge)

Largest dealer of panties in PA.

Mike at the Amish Haven August 2nd, 2009

I didn’t go out today (Saturday) because I really did not have good data. I’ve been working with some heavy hitters on the meteorite list and they have been busy analyzing the two new videos tapes that surfaced this week. I was emailing back and forth with them Friday night and Saturday morning. I didn’t want to go out today without a good location so I decided to work on my maps and trajectory information, rest and go shopping instead. I picked up some good new gear today. Some maps and hiking books, a hikers GPS (so money!), some insect repellent and a few other things.

Before I left to go shopping I got an email from Rob Matson that said he had completed his analysis and had the data I needed. I’ve got a pretty good location of the impact zone and I’m working on my strewn field map. I’m hoping Marc Fries will come through with an updated treasure map before I head out tomorrow. Thanks a million to both Rob and Marc, what they have been able to do and come up with literally blows my mind.

I’m not at liberty to release the precise information but they have encouraged me to publish a close proximity to where the meteorites are most likely to be found. The more people that are out there the better our chances of finding at least 1 rock. The first rock we find will lead us to others, so I really want as many people on the ground looking for these things as possible.

Tomorrows hot zone based on the very best information that is out there are: New Holland, Bareville, Intercourse and Bird-in-Hand PA.

August 2nd, 2009 Meteor Search Map (Click to enlarge)

I found a biking trail that is very near the bulls eye. There is definately a margin of error with the bulls eye so this biking trail looks like a very good place to search. It is a free and public place so you won’t have to deal with land owners. I highly recommend it. I have been told it is best to try to walk a north / south or south / north path. This will improve your chances of actually crossing the trajectory and thus recovering meteorites.

A friend tipped me off about this article that was published in The Aegis Hartford County MD newspaper. Thanks Kristan! Man I hope this is the real deal.

PA Fireball meteorite possible found July 29, 2009 Whiteford MD USA

UPDATE – FAIL

I sent this story out to the meteorite community. Within 15 minutes of pressing send on my email, I got about 20 replies that said there is no way this is a meteorite. Here is the best analysis I’ve seen so far from Eric at MeteoriteBlog.com. Thank Eric that is a pretty comprehensive analysis.

Jupiter with halo July 29, 2009

The stars tonight were bright. The moon set early and some rain came briefly through and then it was perfect. I haven’t seen it this dark in a long while. Since this meteor thing started I’ve only used my scope two times.

Tonight I was reworking the meteor trajectory taking into consideration data from the new video tape and I took a break to go outside. The sky was so dark I could see the Milky Way plain as day. I decided to take a few tripod shots and enjoy the night a little.  The Milk Way shots didn’t quite work out but I got this one of Jupiter that is kind of cool. The halo around the planet is actually an optical anomaly caused I think by dew on my camera lens. Gives it an interesting effect.

As for the meteor, now that some analysis of the new tape has come in we believe we have located a new terminus for the meteor that is 1-2 miles north of the Safe Harbor dam. I have spoken to other meteorite hunters and reliable experts who believe there could be 40,000 grams of meteorite rock near the terminus point. Based on my picture and historical meteorite fall data several different experts believe there could be 3 10,000 gram rocks sitting in a corn field somewhere.

Quarryville July 28, 2009

Our NASA source analyzed the new video footage and told me he recalculated his trajectory based on the new data and his new terminus point is 20k west of his original location. We are working on a new strewn field map so that we can have a plan of attack this Saturday when we go out again. Prior to this new data the estimated strewn field was in Quarryville. When I was in Quarryville, I spoke to an Amish farmer who said his farm hand had witnessed the event and felt that it was so close he ducked down when it flew over. The boy claims to have seen the meteor crash into the ground. The boy’s location was 5 miles north of the Quarryville farm I was visiting. I haven’t calculated this account into my analysis yet, but with a quick eye up it looks possible.

Amish Tractor

I have reworked my line of site analysis of all locations and factored in the new Safe Harbor data. I believe my new trajectory and terminus point are better than they have ever been, its my best guess but it is still just a guess. I have some work to do on the meteor path before I publish it here, especially considering my last two guess were way wrong. With the new data and help I’m getting I’m feeling much better about this new projection. I have to do another lego shadow analysis before I can know for sure. I will post an updated map with meteor path and estimated terminus point tomorrow.

I went out to the Safe Harbor Dam again today and met with the facilities manager. He didn’t want his name mentioned so we will just call him Bob. I picked up the video on DVD Saturday and Bob wasn’t there as he started his vacation that Friday. He emailed me today and said if I brought a thumb drive with me he could give me a better quality video. I met him at the dam at 6:00 PM and we talked about the video, where the cameras were and what he thought the meteor path would have been based on his knowledge of the plant and video. I was way off on my original observations and subsequent conclusions. When I first viewed the video and surveyed the site, I believed the cameras were in certain places when in reality they were in totally different places. So Bob helped me out big time understanding the layout of the dam and the path this meteor took when it passed by. He also came into the office while he was on his vacation and worked with me for over an hour. Thanks so much Bob!

Here is the video. I have edited the footage to include slow motion view, images of the site and the line of site and meteor path projections map. Watch the whole thing, the best images are at the end.

Important note about time in video (1:04:45): I talked to Bob about the clocks in his videos and asked if they were on time. He was adamant that the clocks were perfect time as this is required because they are a federal organization.

Here are the two full length un-edited videos. They are both about 1 minute long. Cam 1 event happens about halfway through. Cam 2 event happens in the beginning.

Cam 1 Full Length Highest Res Possible

Cam 2 Full Length Highest Res Possible

For easy reference here are some of the pictures used in the video:

Safe Harbor cam 1 top view

Safe Harbor cam 1 top side view

Camera 2 Line of Site View

Camera 2 opposing view

Click Picture Below For Bing Maps View

Safe Harbor camera line of site and estimated (best guess) meteor path

Check out Microsoft’s Bing for bird’s eye views of Safe Harbor. Bing Maps is so money. The satellite images are much higher quality and more current than any other earth software out there. Plus birds eye view is SICK!

Click Picture Below For Bing Maps birds eye view

A lot of other stuff has happened today. I have much to report from the field dealing with crazy angry people to pleasant helpful Amish farmers. I also have lots of news from the NASA source but I have to keep that under wraps for a little while still (sorry). Its late, I will post again tomorrow.

I got my first email from NASA yesterday regarding the meteor search. OMG! (that’s all I can say for now.)