Journal Snags's Journal: Man-made meteors possible?
Could NASA create a man-made meteor shower by
throwing marbles from the Space Shuttle?
- Leonid meteors travel at about 72 km/s.
- A bullet travels at about 1 km/s.
- Both friction with the air and friction within the compressed air in front of a meteor cause heat. I.e. the meteor feels a friction force much greater than that due to the air density. It "sees" a higher density because it compresses the air a bit.
- Bill Cooke is a meteor expert at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center. He gave the above information in a space.com article.