Anyone heard of the Siberian Fireball?

[TimM]

In 1908, something came down from space, in Siberia, and blew up, flattening miles of trees.  Because the area where it came down was so remote and sparesly populated, no one died.  Because of that, it was not until 1927 that an investigation took place.  The scientists that went out there found the devastated forest, but there was no crater (unlike Meteor Crater in Arizona).  Over the years, there has been speculation as to just what it was.  Was it a meteor?  A comet?  A UFO?  No one really knows.

I wonder what Nicky and Alix thought of this.  It happened during their reign, after all.

[Svetabel]

You speak about famous Tounguskiy Meteor, and speculations about what was this had been circulating all 20 century.

[TimM]

Yeah, I know.  Was Nicky informed of this event, I wonder.  They said the blast was heard for thousands of miles.

[RomanovsFan4Ever]

You can also take a look here in the topic "Tunguska - reaction of the Tsar", see in particular the reply #5.

http://forum.alexanderpalace.org/index.php?topic=11434.0

As I wrote there, I once read on a scientific magazine about an "expedition sent by the Tsar to the place of explosion", it was just mentioned and not detailed explained, but don't take that information in consideration, because I came to the conclusion that it wasn't a reliable source at all!, since I've read other things about other subjects on the same magazine that were definitely non-senses.

[TimM]

Well, it is possible that Nicky sent someone out to take a look.  However, if it did happen, no records have ever been found.   If they did exist, they were probably lost in the chaos of the revolution.

[RomanovsFan4Ever]

Yes it can be quite possible anyway, but I hope that I will find some informations about it from a more reliable source.
Once I read on The Encyclopedia of Unsolved Mysteries  by Colin and Damon Wilson that in the Siberian village of Nizhne-Karelinsk the explosion was clearly felt (actually if I recall corretly they spoke about a series of explosions, not just one), the entire area was shaken as by an earthquake and the sky took strange colors (as after a powerful vulcanic eruption), it was described as a big blue cloud that expanded very quickly...it was quite an interesting reading, however it didn't said nothing about an expedition sent by the Tsar.
The authors didn't mentioned to who that story was told, but I think that probably that was told to the members of the expedition of 1927...that year wasn't so distant from 1908, so those wo were young in 1908 still remembered.

[TimM]

Yeah, that 1927 group did talk to people who remembered 1908.

[RomanovsFan4Ever]

Another testimonial:
The farmer Semen Semenov told that he saw the sky open in two and immediately after he felt the big explosion, he even told of having been raised and thrown a few feet back by the shock wave...he was in Vanavara, 40 miles south of the explosion.

The powerful shock wave caused by the impact had nearly caused the derailment of some convoy on the Trans-Siberian Railway.

but there was no crater (unlike Meteor Crater in Arizona).

According to a new theory, the crater could be the now called Lake Cheko.

[TimM]

According to a new theory, the crater could be the now called Lake Cheko.

I wonder why no one saw that before now. 

[RomanovsFan4Ever]

Here you can see a photo of the lake...effectively it do looks like a crater...



Although an investigation of 1961 concluded that the lake's age was approximately 5000 years, a very more recent study suggests that it should be much more younger, approximately one century, and also, according to this recent study, just one meter of the lake bed sediments are considered as normal lake sediments.

[TimM]

Well, the dating of one century would put the lakes age at the correct time.

[RomanovsFan4Ever]

Translation of an Italian article dated October 30, 2007. - I hope that I did a correct translation...

On the scientific magazine "Terra Nova" had been published the work of a group of Italian researchers of the ISMAR-CNR and the Universities of Bologna and Trieste - Luca Gasperini, Francesca Alvisi, Gianni Biasini, Enrico Bonatti, Giuseppe Longo, Michele Pipan and Romano Serra - who led a scientific expedition on the site of the Tunguska event.[/i]
Studies show that the Lake Cheko, a small pound of about 500 meters of diameter, located about 10 Kilometers from the epicenter of the explosion of 1908, may be the crater caused by the impact of a "fragment" of about five feet, survived from the principal explosion who crashed in "low speed", that is about one Kilometer per second.

The principal explosion would occurred in the atmosphere, at 5-10 Kilometers above the Tunguska region, explains Luca Gasperini of the ISMAR-CNR of Bologna, this was the explosion of an asteroid or a comet of about 50-80 meters of diameter.

THE RESEARCH: "We carried out a sedimentological and geophysical study of the lake to see if its formation could be related to the event, and to detect the sequence of lake sediment geochemical and geophysical evidence from which to draw information on the nature of cosmic object" said Luca Gasperini of ISMAR-CNR.
"Several previous expeditions have already explored the area, but without find signs of impact or fragments.
Our field study has been carried out mainly using surveys of underwater acoustics, with a goal therefore more ambitious than the first Italian expedition in 1991, also organized by Professor Giuseppe Longo of the University of Bologna, and limited research of micro-cosmic object in the resin of trees. "

A DIFFERENT LAKE: During the expedition "Tunguska99" was therefore first investigated with sophisticated techniques and the morphology of the nature of the lacustrine deposits of the substrate, and collected sediment samples. "Thanks to these surveys - added the researcher - it was possible to find that the morphology of the lake is different from the common origin of Siberian lakes thermo-karst: the nature of the sediments recovered from the lake bed are compatible with hypothesis of "impact that would have occurred in a swampy forest with an underlying layer of permafrost (permanently frozen soil) is often over 30 meters."

"It was exactly the thawing of permafrost occurred short time after the impact to shaping the current size of the lake, and and hide the true nature of crater for all that long time.
This finding, if confirmed, will unravel the mystery of Tunguska, giving strong contributions, for understand the effects of the impact of an asteroid or comet on Earth."

[TimM]

Thanks for posting this

[TimM]

A meteor came down in Russia today.  Unlike Siberia, people were hurt this time:


http://www.thestar.com/news/world/2013/02/15/meteor_explodes_in_the_sky_above_russia_injuring_hundreds.html

[TimM]

A theory I've heard about was that the Siberian Fireball was an accident caused by Nicola Tesla.   In 1908, he had this tower out in long island, so the story goes, that could fire energy bolts.  He said he would shoot one towards the Arctic, so an expedition there would see it.  However, after he fired it, the expedition said they saw nothing.  However, some have said that Tesla miscalculated and his energy bolt hit Tunguska instead.

Of course, I don't know how much truth I'd put into this theory.  If Tesla could build something that could fire energy bolts like that, surely the U.S. Government would have been interested.