On December 29, 2017, a geostationary lightning cartographer (a device aboard two meteorological satellites) recorded a bright meteor in the Earth’s atmosphere over the western Atlantic Ocean
NASA research for better understanding the effects of asteroids received unexpected support from a new satellite sensor designed to search for lightning. It turns out that a new geostationary lightning mapper (GLM) on two meteorological satellites is capable of collecting signals from meteors in the earth’s atmosphere.
GLM finds meteors when their brightness exceeds the full moon. Such objects are called fireballs and are usually created by the action of small asteroids. The contribution of the technology will improve the prediction of effects by examining the travel of the fragments in the atmospheric layer. The range of heights over which asteroids apply kinetic energy (motion) determines how dangerous the shock waves are to the surface. Now, the light profiles from GLM will be used in a future version of the NASA auto reporting system.
GLMs are designed to map lightning outbreaks across vast geographic regions. The device receives 500 images per second from the geostationary orbit, where the satellite is located in the same position relative to the rotating planet (height is 22000 miles).
A bright flash created by a meteor in December 2017, GLM was recorded. The image shows one moment that released 3 kilotons of energy into the atmosphere. The inset shows a meteor in red, and blue - a faint light reflected from the oceanic surface
The device considers the Earth in a narrow wavelength range of light. GLM is one of several instruments on new geostationary environmental satellites 16 and 17, operated by the National Atmospheric and Ocean Administration. Most of the lightning flashes are extremely short, but the relatively long signals of the cars are not filtered out of the data. The fact is that GLM is also designed to measure a longer type of lightning. On board GOES-16, launched in November 2016, managed to fix 10 cars.
The first car found is dated February 6, 2017. Over 500 people reported the event that day. Other objects found demonstrate various ways of fragmentation. They include the one that caused the fall of a meteorite in Canada, and another major explosive event in the western Atlantic Ocean.
