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NASA To Investigate Mysterious 'Space Ball'
redletterdave writes "In mid-November, a hollow space ball fell from the sky and crashed into the earth in Namibia, the African nation situated above South Africa and west of Botswana and Zimbabwe. Authorities recovered the sphere in a grassy village north of Windhoek, the country's capital. The hollow ball, which appears to be made of 'two halves welded together,' has a rough surface, a 14-inch diameter and measures 43 inches around. The strange globe created a crater 13 inches deep and almost 12.5 feet wide, but was found almost 60 feet from the landing spot. Paul Ludik, the police forensics director investigating the case, says the dense ball weighs 13 pounds and is made of a 'metal alloy known to man.' NASA and the European Space Agency will both help investigate the strange occurrence."
SPACEBALLS?
The Great Space Ball Mystery Has Been Solved
"For anyone wondering what it actually is, it's likely a 39-litre hydrazine bladder tank (based on its apparent size; there are also much larger hydrazine tanks)," he wrote. "They're used on unmanned rockets for satellite launches, which would explain why they're falling down in such a specific geographic footprint."
Mythbusters were shooting in Africa?
Caution: Do not taunt Happy Fun Ball.
I wonder, how fast would this space ball need to be going in order to dig all the way through Namibia and land in South Africa?
It's a COPV, see here or page 11 here. The wrapping has probably shielded it enough during the atmospheric re-entry and then ripped away, or it could be from lower altitude flight. In fact NASA and ESA have already studied this object, and most responsible news outlets have explained it along with the newsreport. The only real question is which mission or ship it is from, but unfortunately that might never be found out.
14-inch diameter and measures 43
Thanks for sharing numbers that almost defy pi.
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Was it an African or European space ball?
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It's so obvious what this is, Wheatley fell down from space...
Considering the timing, it's obviously just a giant christmas ball which fell from a geostationary christmas tree put there by our future intergalactic cruisading space-christian overlords. It is almost 2012 afterall.
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Created in the LEGO experiment at CERN in Denmark, it traveled through the political hole neutrino tunnel dug by the Italian education minister. It popped out of the other end of the tunnel in Namibia an exclaimed, "I knew I should have taken that left turn at Los Alamos in Albuquerque!" Theoretical mathematically inclined experimentally minded Gedanken physicists quickly solved the observed event by slapping a few new dimensions that we can't observe onto the creaking load in Grandma 's basket of string theories model.
Schrödinger's cat may or may not have been involved, and law enforcement sources will only state that they are in the state of considering the wacky cat as a "feline of interest" at the moment, as observed from their event horizon.
Meanwhile, an enraged God crawled out of the sea at Tokyo and is smashing the paper skyscrapers in the city, whilst searching for His particle. It seems that He wants it back. Japanese defense forces are deploying ludicrously tiny plastic models with firecrackers attached to their canons, in an effort to force God to get His hairy ass out of their city.
A military spokesmen stated that they were trying to taunt God into making a mistake, but weren't sure yet what that mistake could be.
Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
Mysterious Space Ball fell to earth in Namibia, presumably from outer space.
Authorities recovered the Mysterious Space Ball in a grassy village north of Windhoek, the country's capital.
Mysterious Space Ball, which appears to be made of 'two halves welded together,' has a rough surface, a 14-inch diameter and measures 43 inches around.
Mysterious Space Ball created a crater 13 inches deep and almost 12.5 feet wide, but was found almost 60 feet from the landing spot.
Mysterious Space Ball weighs 13 pounds and is made of a 'metal alloy known to man.'
NASA and the European Space Agency will both help investigate Mysterious Space Ball.
Do not taunt Mysterious Space Ball.
... it would end up in the pasta sauce, with tomato puree
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
"But NASA's got the spaciest balls of them all!"
I came here wondering why there were no references to the falling spotlight in The Truman Show. The fact that every such reference has been removed tells me everything I need to know.
Its actually just sensationalism, as usual.
Look here at types and descriptions of reentered objects.
How many 'spheres' do you count?
"Namibia, the African nation situated above South Africa "
I think you mean "to the north of South Africa." Otherwise, the real story here is how Namibia came to be floating over South Africa.
Los Alamos in Albuquerque
Los Alamos is in Los Alamos (go figure, right?). Sandia National Lab is in Albuquerque (50 to 75mi south of Los Alamos, rough guess...)
As someone else pointed out, most of the re-entered objects that are reasonably intact are spherical tanks. They're one of the few components of a spacecraft that are very solidly built. Most are titanium, or titanium wrapped in Kevlar, so they can take re-entry temperatures. Spheres have good re-entry aerodynamics. Nose cones have been hemispherical since the late 1950, after it was discovered that pointy noses look cool but don't work well. (See the X-3 Stilleto, an unsuccessful jet plane from 1952. Looks it was designed by George Lucas.)
Huh? I... I don't know that.
If you could reason with religious people, there would be no religious people
and ask it where it came from.
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