According to Ludovic Ferrière, curator of the NHM meteorite collection, that is about to change, because science needs your help to calculate trajectories and to recover the cosmic visitors.
The researcher from the Natural History Museum (NHM) Vienna has already been involved in some meteorite salvage operations and has installed specialized meteor cameras that are integrated into the “AllSky7” fireball network. Behind this is a Europe-wide association dedicated to collecting information on current fireball sightings. Two such meteor cameras are already installed on the roof of the NHM and others from the “FRIPON Austria network” will soon be installed throughout Austria. The more sightings are reported to the experts, the more precise conclusions can be drawn about the trajectory, speed, size, nature and ultimately possible impact points.
In this context, Ferrière refers to an online form that is easy to fill out, with which people who have observed or even filmed a possible fireball event can their sightings and personal impressions can describe. According to initial information from the “AllSky7” network, Monday’s event was a “very bright fireball”. She was also able to be held on the roof of the NHM.
Finding parts unlikely
Researchers are currently working on the basis of the videos to calculate the trajectory of the extraterrestrial chunk, as Ferrière explained. Experts from the Astronomical Institute of the Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic have now been able to roughly work up the event: According to this, the meteorite had an estimated diameter of 70 to 80 centimeters and a weight of around 260 kilograms when it entered the atmosphere. The fireball became visible from a height of around 100 kilometers over the southern German cities of Ingolstadt and Regensburg. The case was no longer visible from a height of 35 kilometers west of the city of Höchstadt near Nuremberg (Bavaria).
The chunk was initially traveling at around 24 kilometers per second. The approximately six-second event could be seen from Denmark to central Italy. According to Ferrière, based on the information so far, it is very unlikely that any parts will be found. These would be very small and hardly identifiable even with organized search campaigns.
Last meteorite recovery in France
Such recoveries are extremely rare overall: a meteorite fragment weighing 233 grams was last recovered on Austrian soil on July 4, 2021 in the municipality of Kindberg (Styria). The newcomer, now known as the “Kindberg meteorite”, is only the eighth such find in Austria in the past 250 years and the first since 1977. It was found through the collaboration of researchers and interested laypeople. The fireball from the fall was observed at 04:46 on November 19, 2020.
Ferrière recently succeeded in recovering and classifying a meteorite in Normandy in northern France. A crash was observed here on February 13, 2023. As a result, the researcher was able to recover a fragment weighing only around five grams with the characteristic traces of the fiery landing on earth and classifying it as “common chondrites”. The piece of the now officially named “Saint-Pierre-le-Viger” meteorite has recently been on display in the meteorite collection at the NHM.
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