Message posted by Tamara on September 27, 2004 at 22:37:18 PST:
Howdy all. Long-time reader, first time poster. Last night, about 8:15 pm Pacific, four of us were just inside Calico Ghost Town in the Mojave Desert (CA, I-40). The park was closed, we were on a private tour. We saw a meteor to the north of us, traveling west. If the full moon (in the eastern sky)were the size of a quarter, the meteor would be almost the size of a dime. This wasn't a fireball. It was a big hot red-orange-yellow chunk of something, vaguely squarish and pocked, rugged-looking. There was a tail, but it was faint. The rock itself had excellent definition. The first of us to spot it saw it at about the 11 o'clock position -- the other three also saw it from about 10 to 8 o'clock. (I think the hilly horizon, from where we stood, would be at about 7 o'clock -- and Barstow at 6 o'clock, down in the west valley. I'm sorry I don't know the proper terminology to describe this.) At that point, the meteor simply winked out. It may have been low enough to disappear behind the westward Calico range or maybe the next range farther north. I don't know and wouldn't trust my judgement. I do know that the rock did not change in appearance (except distance-related). There were no sounds, no vibrations, no lights behind the hills. It was simply there, then not there. Wouldn't something that burns up in the atmosphere turn into a fireball first? This looked more like a big ugly hunk of hot charcoal or lava rock in the pit that's had most, but not all, of the ash knocked off. We could see the pitting and sharp edges clearly. Googling news and NASA has shown nothing. This thing was huge (relatively speaking) -- I've only seen anything resembling it in movies. (In fact, it looked a lot like the early warning chunks shown in that old Sean Connery movie, Meteor.) The meteor was almost assuredly visible from the city of Barstow. That's why it's hard to believe there were no sightings. (I wouldn't expect any from the military bases...Hmmm. Maybe what we saw was the new unaerodynamic PT Cruise Missle. . .) If anyone has any thoughts (or data) I'd love some insight. The meteor, while up there in the top 10 amazing things I've ever seen, doesn't pique my Thanks so much!
interest nearly as much as the lack of reportage.
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