DETECTION OF A METEOROID ENTRY INTO THE EARTHS ATMOSPHERE ON FEBRUARY1, 1994

Infrared and visible wavelength sensors on board platforms operated by the U.S. Department of Defense detected an energy release over the ce ntral Pacific Ocean on February 1, 1994, estimated to be of the order of at least tens of kilotons of TNT. The event has been assessed by th e Defense and Intelligence Community to be a meteoroid entry. The obje ct broke up into several fragments and created debris clouds which wer e tracked for over an hour. The meteoroid entered at about 24 km/s and an angle of approximately 45 degrees on a heading of approximately 30 0 degrees. From this, the object's heliocentric orbit just prior to en try was calculated to have a semimajor axis of about 1.6 AU, an eccent ricity of about 0.65, and inclination of 2.1 degrees. The radiant ener gy released is modeled to be between 1.4 x 10(13) J and 2.6 x 10(14) J or equivalent to 3.4 to 63 kilotons of TNT, and the total kinetic ene rgy of the meteoroid is estimated to be in the range 1.4 x 10(14) J to 2.6 x 10(15) J or equivalent to 34 to 630 kilotons of TNT. From the k inetic energy and if we model the object as composed of silicates with a density of 3.5 g/cm(3), we derive a mass range of 5 x 10(5) to 9 x 10(6) kg and a diameter range of 6 to 17 m.