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(meteorobs) Meteoroids as "dustballs" (was Re: How fast do Meteors go?)
In a separate (and very technical) thread, Robert Gardner asks:
>McKinley also [refers] to "dustballs", which I presume is one of
>these nebulous meteors... ?
Actually Robert, McKinley is here referring to the theoretical idea that
meteoroids really should NOT be thought of as "rocks in space"... Instead,
McKinley suggests that cometary meteoroids may actually be far less dense
and solid than anything we would call a "rock" - instead having more the
density of water, and the consistency of dust bunnies or "stoneflakes". :>
A nebulous meteor OTOH, is something occasionally seen by visual observers,
which is only different from a "normal" meteor in that it doesn't look like
a single linear "streak" - or a moving point of light - but rather like a
more diffuse little "moving nebula" on the sky... No one knows what causes
this visual impression, and so it isn't at all clear that these "nebulous"
meteors have anything at all to do with cometary meteoroids.
In fact if McKinley is right, almost ALL meteors are caused by "cosmic dust
balls"... And when these dustbunnies hit Earth's atmosphere, the expectation
is that they'll produce meteors visually indistinguishable from rocky ones.
Clear skies,
Lew Gramer
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