Thursday, September 08, 2005

Tunguska event half as likely

One of the most famous recent cases of a devastating visit from space is the huge fireball that hit the Tunguska region of Siberia in 1908.

Trees within about a 14 kilometre radius were incinerated and those within a 40 kilometre radius were knocked down.

Many scientists believe the fireball was caused by an exploding comet, around 100 metres wide, says Francis. Others believe a meteor caused the devastation.


Still others have made a case that the Tunguska explosion was due to a crippled alien spacecraft, a possibility that -- while remote -- shouldn't be abandoned. I recommend "The Fire Came By," a speculative interpretation of the Tunguska mystery with a foreword by none other than arch-UFO skeptic Isaac Asimov.

(Some readers will have noted the "block quote" format above. I'm thinking of using this from now on when citing others' writing. Hard-to-read? Let me know.)

12 comments:

Dominus said...

Another culprit may very well have been Tesla, who may have accidently created the blast by charging the surrounding landscape and trying harness it to send a signal half way across the world.

The Andy-Christ said...

I did a paper about Tunguska in college. I researched it objectively and came to the conclusion it was caused by an alien craft. I had to warn my professor about my conclusion when I handed it in. I got an A on it, so he must have bought it!!!

Boogey_Man said...

This has worried me. Assuming this was a space rock of one kind or another, imagine it happening again in a more populated area. If we dont see the thing coming might the government react as if we were being attacked? An instant exchange of nukes is less likely with the passing of the USSR but 'missunderstandings' as still possible.

At least with this kind of disaster we wont have to worry about evacuating the survivors. There wont be any.

Carol said...

Yeah, hard to read. Not enough contrast.

Mac said...

I'd prefer the cited text to be black, not blue-on-blue. Personally, I don't think it's too bad -- especially as I don't plan on citing loads of text -- but there should be a painless way to change the text color.

JEFM said...

How about a tiny particle of anti-matter smashing in Tunguska?

The alien crash seems unlikely to me. 2 crashes (1908/1947) for a high tech civilization travelling enormous distances (probably) seems like a big number for me. Unless there are "dog-fights" (air to air combats) between 2 alien races over our skies all the time and we have NO idea about this ...

Jon

Mac said...

I think Roswell is still an open question. Although I find Redfern's scenario persuasive, I'm still willing to entertain the crash of something "not ours," although I would argue that the chances are slim.

gordon said...

Roswell is folklore. As entertainment, it's fascinating. As information, it's worthless. I think effort is better expended on problems temporally closer to home. Still, that's only one opinion

:-)

W.M. Bear said...

The alien crash seems unlikely to me. 2 crashes (1908/1947) for a high tech civilization travelling enormous distances (probably) seems like a big number for me. Unless there are "dog-fights" (air to air combats) between 2 alien races over our skies all the time and we have NO idea about this ...

Maybe they still have a few transdimensional bugs to work out.... (I keep hearing Scotty screaming over the intercom, "She can't keep up Warp 9 much longer, Captain. She's gonna blow....")

JEFM said...

That is totally possible Bear. Technology is not 100% error free, it never is.

Ken said...

Block quote looks fine.

Ken said...

Oh yah: Carol's right: more contrast needed.