Hi all, just read an interesting article about meteorite formation by the British science journalist Rob Lea. I had never realised that formed cones moving though the atmosphere. I thought that they would tumble and keep a pretty spherical shape.
Meteoroids coming from outer space come in all shapes and sizes, but those which land on earth as meteorites, are found to be carved into a typical conical shape. The reason behind this has been something of a mystery.
To explore the forces that produce cone-shaped meteorites, researchers replicated meteoroids travelling through outer space: clay objects, attached to a rod, served as ‘mock meteorites’ that erode while moving through water.
“While most meteorites are randomly shaped ‘blobs,’ surprisingly many — some say about 25%— are ‘oriented meteorites,’ and complete samples of these look almost like perfect cones.”
Thanks for your post NLL I found it most interesting.
Nice objects Jeremy thank you for sharing.
Why would they tumble?
Certainly that is my expectation although thinking more about it I can rationalise why they need not do so...
As to expectations with the various space craft my expectation as to why they would not tumble is because of the element of human control.
Alex