Earth-grazing meteor...

[Rick]

Inevitably some meteors just skim the outer edges of the Earth's atmosphere and then skip off back into space. Occasionally one comes along that spends a while (in meteor terms) doing this, and there was one earlier in the month that had a visible track extending from Austria to the Channel. Here's the latest orbital analysis of this object:

https://archive.ukmeteors.co.uk/reports/2024/orbits/202407/20240707/20240707_002746.047_UK/index.html

(If the link goes dead, let me know, as it probably means there's been more analysis done and a better orbit computed...)

[Carole]

Yikes

[Rick]

The Earth-grazing Meteor of July 2024

At 00:27:46 UT on the 7th of July 2024, an earth-grazer meteor was observed travelling from near Innsbruck in Austria to a point 30km north of Gravelines on the French coast. The meteor, travelling at 64km/s, traversed a distance of 841 km in 13.3 seconds at an altitude of between 114 and 102 km, crossing over Germany, Luxembourg, Belgium and France before returning to space. The event was detected by 35 cameras from the Global Meteor Network. A number of possible visual sightings were also reported to the IMO.

More: https://www.emeteornews.net/2024/07/24/the-earth-grazing-meteor-of-july-2024/