back to article Watch a hot, speeding space alien explode all over Earth's Beaver

Three NASA cameras have picked up the fiery entrance and explosive exit of a 500lb (226kg) chunk of space rock in the skies over Pennsylvania in the wee small hours of Tuesday. Youtube Video The meteor was spotted at 0450 local time (0950 UTC) sixty miles above Beaver Falls. It was filmed by three video cameras that are part …

  1. WillbeIT
    Boffin

    Beaver and Jubs

    If you insist on estimating the weight of this alien body then at least measure it in something we understand around here. 266 Kg = 53.8095 Jubs

    1. Chris Miller
      Headmaster

      Re: Beaver and Jubs

      To be slightly pedantic, when NASA estimated its mass as 500 lbs, they probably meant somewhere between 400 and 600 pounds, so translating this to an exact number of kg (or jubs) is overkill.

  2. Mark 85

    A warning....?

    If this was Mother Nature's "shot across the bow", at what point does she fire for effect?

    1. DNTP

      Re: A warning....?

      She already did, it's already incoming, our detection countermeasures have yet to spot it.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: A warning....?

      No, that was when she sent another fricking solar system at us.

  3. Tom Chiverton 1

    If you are against Flash so much, why aren't you serving a HTML5 native video player?

    1. This post has been deleted by its author

    2. ChrisB 2
      Facepalm

      Yes - invoice on the way to El Reg for the wholly unnecessary processor overhead and the cost of warding off Flash exploits. Oh, and BTW, the BBC are getting an invoice too - their news site still insists on Flash for some of their output.

    3. Coen Dijkgraaf

      Flash

      Try disabling Flash in your browser and you do get a non-flash version.

  4. Roger Greenwood

    @Neil deGrasse Tyson

    'How's that space program coming along?'

    Not good - we now only export robots.

    1. Destroy All Monsters Silver badge

      Re: @Neil deGrasse Tyson

      Good enough. Gleisners will follow.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: @Neil deGrasse Tyson

      'How's that space program coming along?'

      "Not good - we now only export robots."

      So those at the pinnacle of evolutionary species tree will survive ... - ROTM.

    3. This post has been deleted by its author

  5. Destroy All Monsters Silver badge

    Which I call 20150217_haemorroid in this animation...

    which NASA is calling 20150217_meteoroid in this animation

    > Facebook

    > Adobe Flash

    why.jpg

  6. Clive Harris
    Alien

    re: The meteor ... didn't hit Earth so much as we hit it

    Hmm. Could be awkward with the insurance claim. Will we lose our no-claim bonus?

    1. Jimmy2Cows Silver badge

      Re: re: The meteor ... didn't hit Earth so much as we hit it

      Well we did hit it from behind, so that'd be our fault. Gaia!! Stop texting whilst driving and look where you're fucking going!

      Rule 1: Never admit liability

      1. JCitizen
        Alert

        Re: re: The meteor ... didn't hit Earth so much as we hit it

        I do have a problem with that "from behind" report, as the factoid of 45,000 mph sounded way to fast for that vector!

  7. MrDamage Silver badge
    Headmaster

    Causeing?

    Spell checker on the blink?

  8. DanceMan

    Harumpf!

    If earth has a beaver, it's here in Canada.

    1. Sir Runcible Spoon

      Re: Harumpf!

      "Hmmm, nice beaver!"

      1. Ben Bonsall

        Re: Harumpf!

        Thanks. I just had it stuffed.

  9. Vinyl-Junkie
    Mushroom

    Impact in.... oh!

    We will probably find out about the extinction level asteroid impact at approximately the time it hits us.

    If by some miracle we do detect it in advance, and we're allowed to know about it, the only difference it will make is we will talking about it when it hits...

    1. John Brown (no body) Silver badge

      Re: Impact in.... oh!

      "If by some miracle we do detect it in advance, and we're allowed to know about it, the only difference it will make is we will talking about it when it hits..."

      ...on Facebook and Twitter.

      "Wow!, incoming asteroid! OMG Amazeballs LOL, WTF"

  10. Alister

    The American agency found that detonations in Earth's atmosphere, caused by incoming cosmic rock, are more frequent and more explosive than first thought.

    And yet, you still get people going "we shouldn't waste money on space travel or exploration"

    The sooner we can establish an alternative colony off this rock, the better - no, It won't save those left behind, but it might save the species.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Thing is, the ones left behind will be those that enabled us to leave in the first place. Meaning the worst of the species will propagate, space will not change that truism.

      1. Martin Budden Silver badge
        Facepalm

        You go and tell Buzz Aldrin that he is among "the worst of the species", I dare you. Then after your face has stopped bleeding you can have a think about what sort of people get picked to go on very expensive and dangerous space missions.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Why care if the species survives? If any life survives? Serious questions.

  11. ravenviz Silver badge

    Baaa-ang

    I thought it said a sheepish trajectory!

  12. old_IT_guy

    Not detected...

    "Subsequent research showed that between 2000 and 2013 Earth was hit by two asteroids a year that exploded with a force of more than one kiloton, with the biggest bang a 600 kiloton airburst. None of these meteors had been spotted by telescopes."

    'Roids approaching from the direction of the sun are not detectable from Earth, we need a couple of satellites around the L2 points to see what we cannot from, down here.

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