Atmospheric waves from large meteors Free

The body of airwave data taken by the U.S. Government for the purpose of atmospheric monitoring of distant nuclear explosions, contains fortuitously waves of natural origin as well. We have recently received a portion of this original data base which contains only those signals which are presumably of meteoric origin; other natural signals such as from aurora, volcanic eruptions, meteorological phenomena, etc. having been previously removed from the sample. The ten meteoroid related events have amplitudes of about 0.5 to 10 dynes/cm² and periods at maximum signal amplitude of about 3 to 45 s at horizontal ranges of about 800 to 14 000 km from the source. Using appropriate signal characteristics with models for the source and for propagation of these waves, source energies can be inferred. For these events energy estimates range from about 0.1 kT to as much as 550 kT (TNT equivalent) assuming that a low altitude point source explosion model is applicable. This detailed data set, having been recorded at several widely spaced arrays around the globe, could be used for a new attempt at modeling the propagation of such waves perhaps using methods suggested by Pierce and Kinney. [AFGL‐TR‐76‐0056, Final Report, 13 March 1976.]