UPDATE on our new interstellar friend #A11pl3Z: Citizen scientist Sam Deen has found earlier observations of from June 25-28, from the ATLAS telescope! Now with 6 days' worth of data, the eccentricity of A11pl3Z's trajectory is narrowed down to e=10.4 ± 1.1! ... that's undoubtedly interstellar. 🔭☄️

got interviewed about our paper on 2022 WJ1 by space dot com: www.space.com/the-universe...

The first videos of the #asteroid #C0WEPC5 entry in #Russia are coming out on @telegram. It appears to be very similar to previous asteroid entries (2022 WJ, 2023 CX1, 2024 BX1). Lots of fragments at the end, it probably dropped some rocks in a remote forested area.

for the first time, we were able to compare telescopic observations of an asteroid to later fireball camera observations of it as it burned up -- both techniques agree really well: *2022 WJ1 was the smallest asteroid ever characterized in space*. [woo-hoo!]

out today in the planetary science journal: "Telescope-to-Fireball Characterization of Earth Impactor 2022 WJ1" lead by yours truly. many thanks to my incredible coauthors, especially @meteordoc.bsky.social in the #2 spot, for making this study possible. iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3...

In our new paper on #arxiv, we measure the density and structural composition of mm-sized meteoroids and find that cometary dust arriving on Earth is fluffer than we thought! #astronomy #meteors arxiv.org/abs/2312.00897

See our latest paper on the Golden #meteorite in #Canada which fell into a bed, inches away from the head of Ruth Hamilton who was asleep at the time: arxiv.org/abs/2310.17822 #astronomy

Today's space plot: distribution of orbital heights for cataloged objects currently in Low Earth Orbit, by object type (Starlink is offscale high here). X axis is height in km

Another tiny ~30 g #meteorite ~100 km south of #Quebec City went into the dense woods near Lac Aylmer. Speed of 17 km/s, 66° entry angle. Observed between 85.4 - 28.7 km. Credit: Robert Veronneau, Michel Saint-Laurent, Guy Létourneau #globalmeteornetwork

A #fireball dropped a tiny ~20 g #meteorite some 100 km SW of #Perth, #Australia. It entered the atmosphere at a slow speed of 13.5 km/s, 60° entry angle. It was first observed at a height of 82.6 km and its terminal height was 30.7 km. Credit: Dave Rollinson #globalmeteornetwork