Meteors and Comets-Meteors

A meteor is a streak of light in the sky created by a meteorite crashing into the earth’s atmosphere. When a meteoroid approaches the earth’s upper atmosphere, friction from the air causes it to heat up. The increase in temperature causes the gases surrounding the meteoroid to glow brightly, resulting in the appearance of a meteor. Due to the general dazzling tail of light they leave behind as they travel through the sky, meteors are commonly referred to as shooting stars or falling stars. Most meteors strike the earth’s mesosphere, which is around 50-80 kilometres (31-50 miles) above the surface.

What are Meteors? 

When a meteorite collides with the earth’s atmosphere, it does so at a high velocity, giving it the appearance of a fireball. As a result, shooting stars were meteors rather than stars. Meteors are classified into several categories based on size or brightness.

Types of Meteors

Meteors are classified according to their size, brightness, or distance from the earth.

Earth grazers: Earthgrazers were meteors with lengthy, multicoloured tails which swept close to the horizon. Many earth grazers re-enter space after bouncing off the earth’s upper atmosphere. Others earth grazers disintegrate in the atmosphere, streaking through to the sky like shooting stars.

Fireball: Larger meteors, ranging in size from a basketball to a small vehicle, were known as fireballs. Earthgrazers’ light is brighter and lasts longer than that of fireballs. According to the International Astronomical Union, A fireball is a “meteor clearer than any of the planets.”

Bolides: Bolides were brighter but larger than fireballs because they frequently burst into the atmosphere. On the earth’s surface, these explosions could be heard or even felt. According to some scientists, bolides are fireballs that emit a sonic boom when they speed through the atmosphere.

Meteor Showers

Over an hour, only a few meteors usually are seen, but occasionally the sky is flooded with lights that resemble celestial fireworks. When the earth travels through the orbit of a comet, meteor showers occur. Comets leave a dusty trail behind the “dirty snowball” of rock, ice, plus gas that makes up the comet’s nucleus. The rocky debris collides in our atmosphere as the earth travels throughout a comet’s tail, producing the multicoloured streaks of a meteor shower. Meteor storms, described as having at least 1,000 meteors each hour, are much more intense than showers. In a meteor shower, all meteors appear to come from the same place in the sky. The radiant point, or simply the brilliant, is the name given to this place. The radiant of a meteor shower is termed by the constellation where it occurs. Of course, the comet where the meteors have broken off is the source of the meteors, not just the constellation. The Leonid meteor shower, for instance, looks to emit meteors dropping from the constellation Leo but then is comet Tempel-Tuttle debris. The Leonids, which appear every November, are among the fastest and lengthiest meteors. The Perseids, Orionids, plus Geminids are three other notable meteor showers. Like Leonids are predictable occurrences that occur at specified times each year.

How Do Meteors Form?

When meteors crash into the layer of air that surrounds Earth, friction from the gas particles that make up our planet’s atmosphere warms them up, causing the meteor’s surface to light up and shine. The heat plus tremendous speed ultimately combined to vaporise the meteor, which is normally high above the Earth’s surface. Huge chunks of debris break apart, scattering a large number of fragments throughout the sky. The hues are caused by gases in the atmosphere being heated up by the meteor, and also elements within the debris itself. A few of the larger particles, known as “bolides,” produce very huge “flashes of light” in the sky. 

Meteorite Impacts

Meteorites are larger meteors that make the journey through the atmosphere then settle on the Earth’s surface or even in bodies of water. Meteorites were black, polished rocks that typically include iron or even a mixture of stone plus iron. Several pieces of space rock which make it to the ground and therefore are discovered by meteorite hunters were small and unable to do significant damage. Only the larger meteoroids leave a crater when they hit the ground. They’re also not smokin’ hot, contrary to popular belief. Meteor Crater in Arizona was formed by a piece of space rock that was around 160 feet (50 metres) in diameter. The Chelyabinsk impactor, which hit Russia in 2013, would have been around 66 feet (20 metres) long and then sent shock waves throughout a large area, shattering windows. Large impacts such as these are relatively unusual on Earth now, however, when the Earth was formed billion years ago, it was pounded by incoming space objects of various sizes and shapes.

Conclusion

Meteors often referred to as shooting stars, are bits of space dust and debris which burn up in the earth’s atmosphere, leaving dazzling streaks in the night sky. The countless streaks of light in the sky that occur as the earth travels through into the dusty trail of a comet and asteroid’s orbit are described as a meteor shower. Although big chunks of debris may produce a brighter fireball streak, many meteors are still tiny enough to burn up entirely in the earth’s atmosphere. A meteorite is formed when a meteor lands on a planet. The objects are known as meteoroids when they enter the atmosphere.