Talk:Tunguska event

• Archive 1 - 2004
• Archive 2 - 2005
• Archive 3 - 2006

"Documents a Current Event" tag

There is current news coverage of a crater-like feature discovered in a nearby lake, I'll leave you to Google that for now unless I have more time to come back to this 68.54.17.184 15:44, 30 June 2007 (UTC)

Citation needed OR this section needs to be deleted

The last section of this article says:

"Location of event site disputed

Another hypothesis asserts that a meteor fell in a different area of Siberia.....

The trees photographed by Kulik were probably felled[citation needed] by the Evenki, the local inhabitants, in order to create pasture for reindeer, to construct their characteristic conical log huts, and to collect firewood.

In addition, other evidence[citation needed] suggests the craters found were a natural formation caused by melting frost, and a large rock originally identified as a meteorite was later recognized to be a common morainic stone. Kulik and his associates, however, strongly asserted[citation needed] that they had found the exact spot at which the event had occurred so as not to damage their reputations as competent scientists and researchers...."

This entire section is totally unsubstantiated in both the scentific literature and the popular press. Whoever wrote it is simply speculating and/or adding another layer of BS to the question.

—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 12.96.65.14 (talk) 12:15, 21 March 2007 (UTC).

Occam's Razor?

Great article with lots of really good info!

Not one of the hypothesis is truly convincing (encylopedic) and so would like to see as many alternative ones as possible.

The following statement seems to simplify the predicament that many scientists are facing who claim the Tunguska object was destroyed and yet can find no evidence of debris, let alone a crater.

If you cannot find evidence of debris then it probably was not destroyed.

Supposedly serious scientists are conjuring up some interesting pet theories to make up for the lack of evidence while abandoning the far simpler solution.

It was not destroyed.

Here is the statement:

The proponents of the UFO hypothesis have never been able to provide any significant evidence for their claims except for this video taken by a farmer in the British Columbia mountains of Canada which, indicates the UFO was not destroyed but continues to rove about in the vicinity of the earth. The image in the video exactly matches actual eye-witness testimony describing the Tunguska cosmic body published by the Russian newspaper Sibiron July 2, 1908. This resolves the dilemma faced by the proponents of other hypothesis who claim the Tunguska cosmic body was destroyed and yet can find no debris as evidence.

It seems simple.

How can you have a murder if you cannot find a dead body?

and

If evidence exists which shows the supposed victim is still alive and well then the case is further simplified.

Wouldn't it be interesting if since 1908 and throughout the 20th century there was an increase in reports of a shiny bright cylinder roving about in the vicinity of the earth.

A simple google search should prove it.

Try this simple search: Simple Google Image Cylinder ufo search

Feel this now falls comfortably within the bounds of Occam's Razor and so should be responsibly edited by a qualified and unbiased Wikipedia Editor.

great theory--it exploded, but was not destroyed :) I added a section on the UFO hypothesis. Not the most reliable source in the world, but you wouldn't expect that with a UFO hypothesis. In my opinion --one of the earliest visits by Zeta Reticulans. Start twighlight zone theme: dee dee dee dee, dee dee dee dee. . . Puddytang 18:02, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

Curps, why did you remove the section about the Wardynclyffe Tower? I agree that it's silly nonsense, but no more so than the bits about UFOs or black holes. --Yath 22:54, 12 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Well, Tesla is a person, not a fictitious UFO or an undetected small black hole. Silly nonsense, that's what it is, yes.

There was no comment for several days, so I put it back. --Yath 07:51, 16 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Nonsense? It's well known Tesla experimented with massive amounts of electricity sent into the Earth. Whether or not this could cause something along the magnitude of Tunguska is anyone's guess, but it's hardly "silly nonsense," especially when the other theories involve physical/cosmological impossibilities and UFOs. 153.104.16.114 20:38, 17 December 2005 (UTC)

Tesla claimed that his method could cause great destruction, but this was later at CO. Springs and he needed three widely spaced towers to focus the discharge someplace other than the original tower--yes clearly utter nonsense :) Puddytang 18:08, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

Date confusion

From the article: "Also this event happened on June 30, 1908 and Peary didn't leave New York for the North Pole until July 6, 1908."

Above: "In other words, Peary set sail from New York City six days after the Tunguska event,"

The event happened June 30, 1908 in the Julian calender; July 12, 1908 in the Gregorian calendar. Assuming Pearys departure is given in the Gregorian calendar, he thus left New York prior to the explosion.

--85.166.26.133 14:49, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

Do you have a source for June 30 being the Julian date of this event? I've seen a few sources (eyewittness translation, plus some heresay) saying that June 30 is the Gregorian conversion (June 17 locally). If that's the case, we should remove the Gregorian/Julian warning on the page, and perhaps make it explicit to avoid future confusion. Infotrope 21:54, 15 November 2007 (UTC)

It was a meteorite...of sorts

Basically in 1908 someone got hold of the Black Materia and used it to summon Meteor, possibly with some purpose, possibly without really knowing what they were doing. Fortunately for us, someone else had the White Materia and was able to call Holy. Holy eliminated Meteor in what is now known as the Tunguska Event. M0ffx 20:07, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

2006 69.207.164.24

Attempts to apply carbon-14 dating have shown that the soil was enriched in radioactive carbon-14.

??????? Jclerman 03:13, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

Do you have a reference to that increase of carbon-14 ? Jclerman 01:57, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

Reference to increased Carbon-14 can be found in KUNDT, W. Current Science. 81. 399-407 (2001), its taken as evidence by Kundt as being the result of a massive volcanic gass emission at depth possibly analagous to the intrusion of Kimberlite into the Craton. ClimberDave 16:02, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

He doesn't mention it in [1]. Could you post or email me a copy of the article or of the relevant paragraph? I can't understand how volcanic gas would introduce radiocarbon. Jclerman 18:43, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

Sorry I've just re-read the article it doesn't mention it directly however does talk about enrichment of the soil but instead results from Tree resin analysis. I've forward a copy of the article to your email address with a copy of the Verneshot hypothesis which talks about the event also, which probably provides a more straight forward model of volcanic gas extrusion, particularly in the micro-vernshot model. It seems to me that the hypothesis of kimberlite intrusion is worthy of note on the article page however it has since been removed in favour of apparent direct evidence of bolide impact. However i'm studying impact geology and Tunguska doesn't fit the model, and i'm unsure what the direct evidence is. ClimberDave 13:33, 19 April 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for your reply. I'll be looking forward to your email (it hasn't arrived yet). I checked the hypothesis of Cowan et al. (antimatter). I can't believe it's already 40 yrs ago! The article has references to Cowan's and to my analysis. Jclerman 19:28, 19 April 2007 (UTC)

I'll try forarding the email again ClimberDave 08:52, 20 April 2007 (UTC)

Interesting article linking global warming to Tunguska

Read http://www.physorg.com/news11710.html . The theory is that the destruction of millions of trees initiated the global warming effect. Should be added to the article?

There is also an article at http://www.scienceagogo.com/news/tunguska.shtml linking the Tunguska Event with global warming.

Some have claimed that the Earth was unusually cool for a few years after tunguska. Puddytang 18:16, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

Photo of Lower Tunguska

The existing modern photo of dusk over a body of water in the history section appears to reference the Lower Tunguska river (it's used in the Lower Tunguksa article). While the event happened near the Stony Tunguska (Podkamennaya) River, is the Lower Tunguska close enough to the Stony Tunguska to warrant this photo's inclusion in this article? Can anyone verify? Chikinsawsage 02:56, 1 January 2007 (UTC)

It's a nice photo but seemingly unrelated. As nobody protested, I'm removing it.--87.162.64.70 16:59, 8 November 2007 (UTC)

Removing incorrect (not speculative) science

From the bizarre Tesla theory:

"The large amount of energy required to cause such an event could easily be achieved by the process of electrical resonance in which power could be built up over a period of days. Electrical resonance was a process well known at that time. This power build up over a period of time corresponds to the "bright nights" reported over Europe days prior to the explosion."

This is not speculative at all, it is an incorrect understanding of science. Electrical resonance in this context refers to resonance frequencies of electromagnetic antenna. No electricity is stored. I am removing this paragraph, because it is simply and obviously wrong. I'll leave alone the rest of the Tesla theory, as the section is a listing of unsupported speculative hypotheses, and the paragraph about electrical resonance is not unsupported or speculative, it is a misinterpretation of actual science.

Also, I recommend that the speculation section is split off into its own article rather than included along with actual information from scientific research.

Also incorrect calender. The false dawn over europe occured just after the explosion. Puddytang 18:21, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

UFO theory added again

I thought it was strange that the UFO theory was not included, so I added some stuff from a stupid book I have. Then I found the old UFO section and added it back in too (I'm glad the dogs survived!). So now we have a too-long UFO section. I couldn't figure out who removed this section or why. It is probably the most widely held "crazy" theory about the event and definitely should be included here --that's why wiki is better than brittanica! Puddytang 18:49, 22 February 2007 (UTC) Found it. The deletion was the result of vandalism by : Cman770. Puddytang 18:57, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

End of world theory

I also added back an amusing quote from the end of world theory, but I put it in the lead to the "Crazy theories" section. I think there is aplace for this quote in the article somewhere. Wikipedia can be both informative and fun! Puddytang 19:39, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

I'm concerned that there is no discussion of the evidence for and against the end of the world hypothesis in this section. This should probably be filled out some. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.3.201.248 (talk) 10:21, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

Ball lightning?

Newscientist web sight claims that ball lightning has been generated in the lab and that it expelled beams of charged particles called jets (http://www.newscientist.com/channel/fundamentals/mg19325863.500?DCMP=NLC-nletter&nsref=mg19325863.500). K. A. Kokorin, Kezhma stated he saw .......a flying red sphere, and to its sides and behind it there were visible rainbow streamers. T. N. Naumenko, Kezhma said on a cloudless day. ........ there fell on me the beams of a bright sun, and I had to raise my eyes a little upwards in the direction of the crash of thunder I’d heard, in precisely that direction from which the sunbeams were shining on me..... While another witness might account for this... Stepan Ivanovich Chuchana, Shanyagir Clan, Strelka-Chunya Trading Post The morning was sunny, there were no thunderclouds; our sun shone brightly, as always, and here there appeared a second sun!

"Location of event site disputed" paragraph probably a hoax

Besides the fact that claims in that paragraphs are all unreferenced, in a forum of a popular Italian website[2], an anonymous poster claims to have started this hoax. The IP address of the poster (87.5.237.166) is in fact from Italy[3]. --Eltener 11:00, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

Where is the proof of this event ?

This is the paragraph, look at it !

Is a hoax this paragraph or the Tunguska site by Kulik ?

Location of event site disputed

Another hypothesis asserts that a meteor fell in a different area of Siberia.

Russian mineralogist Leonid Kulik identified the place of impact in a forest near the Podkamennaja River (coordinates 60° 53' 40" N latitude and 101° 53' 40" E longitude.) Between 1921 and 1938 Kulik organized 5 expeditions to the area, but neither a crater nor other evidence of the impact was found.

The area on satellite map

Click on 60°55′N 101°57′E and go to Google maps, satellite. Then make your magnification 20mi/in. You can see that about 40 miles southeast is a perfect circle, about 70 miles in diameter (representing the comet ejecta?). This is still not 60°53′N 101°53′E, it's about 60°14′N 103°10′E (click). Is this some other artifact? It's the right size, and in the same vicinity as the claimed center. -- Gekritzl 19:56, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

The photos of the blasted forest and felled trees, made by Kulik in 1927 and 1928, are not convincing: they appear to be in a perfect state of preservation 20 years after the event, while the only trees still alive are young saplings that can hardly be more than a few years old. The trees photographed by Kulik were probably felled[citation needed] by the Evenki, the local inhabitants, in order to create pasture for reindeer, to construct their characteristic conical log huts, and to collect firewood.

In addition, other evidence suggests the craters found were a natural formation caused by melting frost, and a large rock originally identified as a meteorite was later recognized to be a common morainic stone. Kulik and his associates, however, strongly asserted that they had found the exact spot at which the event had occurred so as not to damage their reputations as competent scientists and researchers. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 87.3.186.202 (talk) 20:26, 26 March 2007 (UTC).

Kimberlite Emplacement or Micro-Verneshot Event

Recently carried out an essay topic for my 4th year geology course, debating the validity of the Verneshot Hypothesis. Interestingly the articles I worked on mentioned the Tunguska event and proposed a Kimberlite or Micro-Verneshot origin. First time adding to an article so if there are any mistakes or any editing advice I'll be happy to take them on board. Hope you all enjoy another Hypothesis on something that has fascinated me since I was a child. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Climberdave (talk • contribs) 14:49, 20 March 2007 (UTC).

Apparently it's been removed now? Any particular reason? The subsection was referenced correctly to published scientific articles ClimberDave

For reference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Michaelbusch#Micro-kimberlite_.26_Verneshot_event_for_Tunguska

Discussion(?)ClimberDave 09:18, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

St Petersburg

From the Article: According to the Guinness Book of World Records (1966 edition), if the collision had occurred 4 hours 47 minutes later, it would have wiped out St. Petersburg.

Why? I don't understand why time make any difference - please offer some small explanation in the article.

This is a matter of latitude: St. Petersburg is at the same latitude as the impact, so if the collision had occurred 4 h 47 m later (or the course of the asteroid been slightly deflected), the impact would have been over the city. Michaelbusch 22:38, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

My contribution (below) is not date-stamped, but it looks like I wrote it before Michaelbusch's addition above (a long time ago, I do not remember the date). If you did add the comment after I wrote the following, you need to re-read it, as you are wrong.Asteroceras 13:20, 26 May 2007 (UTC)

The mention of St Petersburg is entirely meaningless and should be removed. If the impacting body was moved 4 hours 47 minutes forward in time on its orbital path, it would have passed "in front" of the Earth in the Earth's orbit, that is, it would have passed through the volume of space that the Earth had yet to reach. In order to have hit St Petersburg, the orbit itself would have had to be different, not the temporal point within its orbit, though a time difference of a few minutes could still have resulted in a populated area being hit, as the Earth is a three-dimensional target. Unless the Earth's gravity significantly affected the orbit due to the 5-hour near miss, the body could still have collided with the Earth on a future orbit.[User: Asteroceras, cookies not working at the moment]

Confusion

There seems to be some confusion about the direction the Tunguska object was travelling in. Balls of Lightning may account for this. According to the Newscientist web sight, ball lightning has been produced in the lab and they say it ( i quote) emitted little jets that seemed to jerk them forward or sideways. The testimony of T.N. Naumenko includes the discription of an object that flew eraticly. Quote.... there went flying erratically into the taiga an even more white-hot (paler than the sun, but almost the same as the sunbeams) somewhat elongated mass in the form of a cloud, with a diameter far bigger than the moon....without any regularly defined edges.

(I have already highlighted the Newscientist web sight on this talk page under the title of Ball lightning?) (User: Nosut, 14:15 25 March 2007)

No original research, please. Michaelbusch 15:11, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

Actual Evidence of Impact

It seems like the most likely mode of formation for the Tunguska event was an airburst bolide, however is there actually any direct evidence other than the circular arrangement of fallen trees? The current understanding as far as I can make out from the article is that no evidence of an impactor has ever been found, i.e. no tektites, chondrite material etc. A positive Ir anomaly would also be inconclusive due to the presence of the Siberian traps.

Given the recent debates within geological literature concerning alternative interpretations for "impact craters" such as Silverpit crater and Upheaval Dome I suggest that any credible alternative mechanisms be considered for addition to the article, such as volcanic gas release from the underlying craton. The coincidence between the site of the event and the traps is evidence (all be it circumstanstial) in favour of a volcanogenic origin, produce by ignition of released volcanic gas which could arguebly produce the same or similar blast pattern observed from the event and not require the presence of bolide debris. Interesingly the 1999 paper by L. Hyranina (The bouquet of the meteorite craters in the epicentre of Tunguska impact 1908 year)suggested the presence of a Permo-Triassic crater within the flood basalt province below the Tunguska event, termed the Great Tunguska Crater, while the coincidence between this site been struck at the 1908 event by a second impactor is just that a coincidence it would statistically unlikely given the randomness of impact events.

I'm not implying that the impact hypothesis is incorrect or should be removed but it is merely unproven and unsupported at present, and alternative hypothesis should be given equal merit (if of course they are reference to peer reviewed articles). Currently the volcanic gas emission theory has been removed (Re:Kimberlite intrusion) despite references to published acticles (which from my understanding doesn't classify it under POV or OR, stated reasons for removal). I'm just trying to open the floor to discussion on the topic as I don't wish to upset people by reversing the editing on the article prior to hearing numerous other opinions. ClimberDave 14:30, 21 April 2007 (UTC)

• Meteoric material has been found imbedded in trees in the area, on sides facing towards the hypocentre.
• An iridium anomaly would be relevent, as the Siberian Trappes are not specifically associated with enhanced iridium, and even if they were, the concentration in the area of impact would be measurably higher if the impactor was iridium rich.
• Hypothesising "volcanic gas" release requires some "evidence" rather than the circumstance that hundreds of millions of years earlier a large volcanic event occurred there, and also would have to counteract the multiple eyewitness reports of a bolide.
• Calling the impact hypothesis "unproven" is the same as saying that the crash of United 93 on 9/11 is unproven, despite physical evidence and eyewitnesses.Asteroceras 13:41, 26 May 2007 (UTC)

• Until recently the conderitic material in the trees was unmentioned within the article or this talk page, it was merely referred to as definitive evidence by some posters and not referenced and is in fact still absent from the article.
• the Siberian traps do show an iridium enrichment and it is a common feature of other terrestrial activity such as mantle plume related eruption (Re: Iridium content of Reunion island eruptions) and hence casts doubt on the bolide origin for the impact and hence iridium concentrations in the soil could have an alternative origin.
• it does require some evidence hence the referenced article by Klundt who uses the same eye wittness reports cited to support an impact to support the volcanic gas release, and is further supported by reports of a perculiar hue to the sky in the hours and days prior to the actual event. I do find the circumstantial evidence that the bolide impact site coincided with the Tunguska depression interesting, shame there are no statistics dealing with the likelyhood of two theoretically climate changing events occuring at the same locality but totally unrelated in mode.
• it is currently unproven as the article stands, as the information regarding chonderitic material is absent, prior to this even been mentioned there was absolutely no evidence which supported a bolide impact over a gas release and explosion ClimberDave 23:25, 26 May 2007 (UTC)

Information regarding the imbedded chonderitic material has still not been added to the article by the respective parties that have cited it on the talk page. Whats the point in discussing it if it isn't going to be added? ClimberDave 20:33, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

Though it's been a while, maybe you're still watching here, this paper (a very nice source, I have found) explicitly describes the recovery of meteoric particles from the blast site. According to it, the chemical structure of some of the particles makes certain their astronomically recent cosmic origin, but is moot on precisely what type of cosmic body it came from. Further, he actually mentions that the best samples were recovered from the soil itself, and that the recovery of meteoric material from wood proved too difficult for conclusive results. Yet further he has produced a (incomplete) mapping of meteoric dust concentration over the area that agrees with theoretical distribution of meteoric particles from an airbust given the prevailing winds reported on that day. Someguy1221 06:18, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

Looks good, I should make clear I'm all in favor of having the bolide impact stuff in there, its just that I placed a section in "Alternative Hypothesis" which was referenced to scientific articles (most of which are still in the reference list) and it was removed by an impact supporter with the reply when tracked down stating "I removed it because its bollocks". Yet there were no supporting articles for the impact hypothesis present in the text. I'm just trying to have papers like the one you have provided added as references in the text. ClimberDave 19:05, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

=============

I just want to add that till now there is no any Tunguska spacebody substance recovered. Such early claims as in http://abob.libs.uga.edu/bobk/tungmet.html later were found to be over-optimistic. Check here, for example: http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1990Geokh......627N And traps are enriched in iridium.

Sincerely, Andrei Ol'khovatov www.geocities.com/olkhov

=

so as it stands there's equal evidence for the other referenced causes been cited in the article ClimberDave (talk) 19:10, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Eh? Although I can only read the abstract of that paper, it sounds like they're only arguing that the impacting body was a snowball instead of a rock. And challenging the meteorite hypothesis in no way acts as support of the "alternative theories." John says A, Bob says B. When Steven says John is wrong, he's not necessarily saying Bob is right...I think that made sense, yeah. Someguy1221 (talk) 19:22, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Categorization

User:Nima Baghaei has been repeatedly adding back the categories Category:Mysteries and Category:UFO crashes to this page, over my objections. In the interests of ensuring Wikipedia:Consensus, I will explain my reasoning here (I have the support of a few other editors in this regard).

The easier of the two is Category:Mysteries: the Tunguska event is not a mystery. The blast pattern matches that of hypersonic impact, taken as a datapoint on the impact energy-frequency curve it fits very well with known rates from fireballs on the low end and the cratering record on the high end, and we can pull little bits of the impactor out of soil and tree trunks (e.g. [4] and later work), with compositions that match meteorite material. Impact is the only reasonable conclusion.

With regards to Category:UFO crashes: Nima objects on the grounds that the article discusses the speculations of UFO enthusiasts, which are only discussed from a historical and sociological standpoint. If that were the only purpose of the category, it would be reasonable. But the other articles in the category aren't at all like that, so the categorization is inappropriate. If Nima wants to believe that the UFO crash proposition is anything other than a delusion, I will not argue, but that view should not be included here, per WP:FRINGE and the ArbCom Decision on Pseudoscience. Michaelbusch 17:25, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

The above reasoning also applies to including this in the Paranormal Wikiproject. Michaelbusch 17:25, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

Should have been discussed a week ago, instead of reverting by both of you every other day. The link to the article you provide above is handy, but I can't find it within the article or on the reading list hence my query above about actually evidence. Nor does the article make mention of the evidence presented there. So until its added in the article to me still reads like a mystery. Given that it has apparently taken almost 80 years to present this definative proof and the event has been consider unsolved for this length of time, it seems to me that it is registered in popular thought as a mystry (re:Further reading section titles). It may be solved now but its a mystery solved, and has been classed for along time along with tales such as the Marcy Celeste, etc. Justifying its classification as a mystery.

If UFO crash is to be incorperated into the article from any stand point then it seems kinda justified as a cat. However I'd never read about it till coming here and quite frankly the reference seems more like a joke than anything serious, i'll believe the Verneshot hypothesis over that. I agree that the other articles in UFO are different however a quick look at cat:impact events gave me a very similar impression, but given that the Tunguska case is almost unique, it is less of a problem.

Im in favour of leaving Mystery as a cat but not UFO crash ClimberDave 07:53, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Large Asteroid or small meteoroid?

As this has recently changed in the text, I thought I'd pose the question here. Assuming the object that struck Tunguska was ~20 meters across, was it an asteroid or a meteoroid? Or should we use some combined language? I don't know. Quoting from meteoroid:

The current official definition of a meteoroid from the International Astronomical Union is "A solid object moving in interplanetary space, of a size considerably smaller than an asteroid and considerably larger than an atom or molecule." The Royal Astronomical Society has proposed a new definition where a meteroid is between 100 µm and 10 m across.

It makes no difference to me, but I thought I'd go ahead and pose the question as someone might care. Someguy1221 05:53, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

Im more in to my geology, so when were never really sure the term Bolide is used. ClimberDave 09:24, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

tunguska event

Im not a scientist or anyone who lives in this region. Further I do not know if any of this has been discussed elsewhere. But, Im watching the history channel and i start thinking about all of the theories. Here is my hypothosis: A comet being made up of ice and other particles may also contain hydrogen and or methane. If a proper amount of extremely flammable gas or gases are present it is possible to be trapped until the comet reaches a temperature that may start relaesing these gases and finally exploding with enough force to cause the damage that was reported.

Just a thought. jr austin, tx

If that were so, it would have exploded in entry through the atmosphere, long before the explosion. P.S. The History channel bit on the TE was pretty good. :-) ~ UBeR 07:38, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

Article could emphasize this mystery: Why does the largest impact leave no crater ?

"largest impact"

"no crater was found."

Michael H 34 05:01, 8 June 2007 (UTC) Michael H 34

The blast pattern (and lack of a crater) was similar to the effects of some above-ground nuclear bomb tests. This is discussed in the article. Someguy1221 05:17, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

If the official explanation that the Tunguska event was caused by the impact of a bolide, then the mystery of no crater is insufficiently emphasized.

Who was doing nuclear tests at the time of this event?

Michael H 34 00:09, 10 June 2007 (UTC) Michael H 34

Not impact, air burst. The thing never hit the ground except in tiny pieces. And the nuclear testing did not create the hypothesis of a bolide exploding in mid air, it merely provided evidence of what a gigantic mid-air explosion would do to a forest. Someguy1221 08:30, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

I agree that this is the consensus explanation. However, this is not clear in the article. The article should be clear that the conclusion about this event is that no impact occurred because presumably the bolide disintegrated, presumably just prior to what would have been an impact.

Michael H 34 16:08, 15 June 2007 (UTC) Michael H 34

There is now a proposed crater for the Tunguska event. See Has a Tunguska Crater Been Found? by David Tytell and dated June 22, 2007. The journal article that made the suggestion is A possible impact crater for the 1908 Tunguska Event by Gasperini et al. doi:10.1111/j.1365-3121.2007.00742.x MichaelSH 02:35, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

This could certainly be worked into the article, but only as an alternative theory, given the wealth of sources claiming it to be an airburst, and the novelty of this new research. Someguy1221 07:38, 26 June 2007 (UTC)

So it turns out this isn't even a new hypothesis. [5]. Someguy1221 05:59, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

The Wardenclyffe Tower

Here is an interesting site outlining the connection between Nikola Tesla and the Tunguska event:

http://prometheus.al.ru/english/phisik/onichelson/tunguska.htm

This article was written by a Harvard professor in 1995.

This is the same article that's already cited in the section, simply from a different website. Someguy1221 14:57, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

I deleted the "Wardenclyffe Tower story".

The idea that in the 19th century Nikola Telsa was able to generate and wireless transfer the energy of 1000 nuclear bombs (and accidentally did without him or anyone else knowing) seems, well, to put it kindly, not very elaborate. And no sources other than some websites. Christoph Scholz 10:41, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

10 to 20 megatons

I put the (fact) tag next to the 10-20 megaton statement, because a number of sources places the blast at 40 megatons. 10 to 20 appears to be common ly used figure, but it still would be nice to have at least some reference to back this number up. Alex Pankratov 17:56, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

I have added a reference to this effect. It states that calculations have fallen in the 10-20 megaton range. It also mentions an estimate of the blast being 670 megatons, but then refutes this, claiming certain evidence shows the blast to have been no more than one twentieth of this, roughly. I haven't changed the article text, I'm not sure the best way to handle it, although certainly we don't need to explain every single claim that's ever been made about it. Someguy1221 00:30, 26 June 2007 (UTC)

Thanks, Someguy1221. The original reason I added a tag was a mentioning of 40 megaton in this post (it's a Russian news site). It was supposed to be a summary of a new paper on the subject by Italian researcher. Before tagging, I poked around the I-net and I came across 4 more unrelated references to 40 MT number. The original of the paper was not available at that moment. I did manage to find a copy just now and there's no traces of 40 MT. They have it at 15-20 MT. I'm not sure what that news site translators were smoking, but it certainly was a potent stuff. Thanks for the response and the edit. Alex Pankratov 01:05, 26 June 2007 (UTC)

Selected eyewitness reports

I have reverted the removal of entire "Selected eyewitness reports" section by Edward Morgan Blake. The content is non-trivial and relevant. The section is already tagged as containing unsourced material, so purging the content is simply an overkill. The better way of resolving the situation is to contact the author of this section and ask to provide the sources. Alex Pankratov 19:26, 1 July 2007 (UTC)

Well, they are sourced, merely the sources are non-specific. Someguy1221 00:39, 2 July 2007 (UTC)

The very same section was again removed without any notice, discussion or even specifying the reason. I reverted the removal again and left a message on editor's Talk page asking to clarify the situation here. Alex Pankratov 18:08, 2 July 2007 (UTC)

Hello. The article has been tagged as unreferenced for two months. This was more than sufficient notice to allow the editor who added the material, or indeed anyone familiar with the subjects and the sources to cite the quotes and justify their inclusion. I agree that the content is non-trivial and relevant, but like everything here it needs to be verifiable. For all I (or anyone) knows, it could be fabricated out of whole cloth - I am not saying that it has been, I'm just saying that, as written, there is no proof that it wasn't. Again, two months is more than enough... at some point unverified material needs to be removed, otherwise we'd have masses of articles with possibly false information and dozens of tags. I am simply following longstanding policy in regards to article content, policy important enough to be mentioned just be just below the edit box ("Encyclopedic content must be verifiable"). Whoever added it got it from somewhere, and once they say from where, then it can be added. --Edward Morgan Blake 02:01, 3 July 2007 (UTC)

While I agree that more easily confirmable sourcing is required, please note that the eyewitness reports are actually sourced. Above each report is the source of the report. The problem is that said sources are not perfectly specific as to where they might be located, with the additional issue that the sources were published in print, and done so 77 to 99 years ago. But there is certainly enough information provided about the source to allow verification to anyone with access to 100 year old Russian newspapers. Please also note that there is no requirement for sources to be easily verifiable, as such sources are often non-existent for events that took place long before the age of the internet. I'll head down to the library when I can next week, and see if I can't dig up any more recent publications of the reports. Someguy1221 02:23, 3 July 2007 (UTC)

I'll too see what I can find. I am fluent in Russian, so I might be able to dig something up in Russian sector of Internet. Alex Pankratov 02:28, 3 July 2007 (UTC)

I have done the safe thing and re-removed them for now. It will be a simple matter to re-insert the quotes as sources are located. --Edward Morgan Blake 02:51, 3 July 2007 (UTC)

I am reverting the removal. The material is relevant, chances that it is fabricated or completely unsupported are very low. Alex Pankratov 03:14, 3 July 2007 (UTC)

1st quote: http://www.znanie-sila.ru/online/issue_2216.html - Znanie-Sila is a magazine, which is an equivalent of Scientific American. The Russian version of the first quote (by S.Semenov) is located next to the first photograph. The quote is given in a context of the book "Tunguska Meteorite, Cosmic phenomenon of the summer of 1908" by Nikolaj Vasiliev (the guy on the photo). ISBN 5-93165-106-3 ~54.00.00/06053. The article also says that the same book contains over 700 eyewitness accounts, so there's a good chance other quotes are the book as well.

2nd quote: it's from the book called "Eyewitness accounts of Tunguska (Crash)", published in 1981, no ISBN number. Authors - N.V.Vasiliev, A.F.Kovalevsky, S.A.Razin, L.E.Epiktetova. The quote is from Section 5 of the book, section title is "Accounts collected by I.M.Suslov in 1926". Full copy of the book is available here - http://tunguska.tsc.ru/ru/science/1/0, the section in question is here - http://tunguska.tsc.ru/ru/science/1/0/6.

3rd quote: same book, section 1 titled "newspaper reports" or "newspaper clippings", item #2. Section is here - http://tunguska.tsc.ru/ru/science/1/0/2

4th quote: same book, same section, item #3

5th quote: same book, same section, item #5

Alternative source for 1st quote is the same book, section 6, item #4. Section source is here - http://tunguska.tsc.ru/ru/science/1/0/7

Please can someone fold this into the article ? I am not *that* familiar with <ref> syntax, and I am also short on time at the moment. Alex Pankratov 04:10, 3 July 2007 (UTC)

Edward Morgan Blake, please stop removing the content. This hardly serves any purpose whatsoever. Alex Pankratov 03:27, 3 July 2007 (UTC)

Well, I see I don't need to visit the library next week (thank God, I hate libraries). I'll add the refs. Someguy1221 04:25, 3 July 2007 (UTC)

Do you know the publisher of the book? I am three generations removed from my Russian ancestors, and fully from all knowledge of the language. Someguy1221 04:33, 3 July 2007 (UTC)

From what I can gather it is not a published book, but rather a work that is filed with (State) Institute of Scientific and Technological Information (ВИНИТИ in Russian). I am not sure what the English name for this is, but it is very common practice with academic publications. In Russian it's called "deponent", i.e. the work is filed with an academic archive and a copy of it is available to anyone upon request. The "deponent" number for the above book is Б350-81 (first letter is a cyrillic B-ee). Thanks for the edit by the way. Alex Pankratov 18:35, 3 July 2007 (UTC)

And thank you for actually finding it.  :-D Someguy1221 18:37, 3 July 2007 (UTC)

Now that's a start... See, that wasn't so hard, was it? It took me following policy and removing unsourced info to get people to source it even though it had been tagged as such for two full months. Go figure. --Edward Morgan Blake 16:15, 3 July 2007 (UTC)

You could have just asked politely ;-) Someguy1221 18:18, 3 July 2007 (UTC)

What policy? The quotes were already sourced to various, verifiable newspapers and individuals in the first place. If you're quoting Shakespeare, you don't attribute a stand-alone line to a scholar's usage of that quote in a literature journal — you source it to Shakespeare's original work. Do we need to source every source now? No, because that's absurd. — Rebelguys2 ^talk 02:13, 4 July 2007 (UTC)

Visible in sat photo...

I removed:

An overhead satellite view, from nearly a century later, centered at 60°55′N 101°57′E (near ground zero for this event) shows an area of reduced forest density with a clearly visible, irregular clearing of somewhat less than one square kilometer in area.

Since it has no source, and the 1 square kilometer pointed to is probably not related to the 1908 event. (Seriously, 2150 square km of trees felled and 2149 have been regrown? How do we know there were never trees in that small area in the first place?) Anynobody 08:12, 19 August 2007 (UTC)

Source for Slovak Astronomer's Encke Comet Theory

I think this is the source for the slovak guy, i got it off the "comet" wikipedia article. im not sure tho, needs to be checked out

^ The Tunguska object - A fragment of Comet Encke. Astronomical Institutes of Czechoslovakia. Retrieved on 2007-02-15. (this is in the reference list of the Comet article if you want to check it out)

--just trying to help-- —Preceding unsigned comment added by 125.239.112.223 (talk) 07:59, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

Ah, thank you for that. Unfortunately, this paper doesn't mention those fabled "military satellites" :-( So that part will keep its {{fact}}. Someguy1221 08:14, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

Tesla - again

One of the main tenets of Wikipedia is that is encyclopedic about information, not subjective about information. The Tesla theory, while maybe not the correct explanation, is one of the more popular theories about the event. A simple Google search for "Tesla and Tunguska" reveals that this is not some small group of nut jobs positing the idea - it is a significantly large number of nut jobs! ;) For an encyclopedic article to completely ignore the theory reeks of some people pushing their view rather than simply reporting what is out there. UFO's are a much wackier and far less well known theory than Tesla. It is a disservice to this article and to Wikipedia not to mention him here. James 04:07, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

Well if someone does reinstate it, please use this reference (or a better one if you someone can find one) to explicate how dumb it is. Someguy1221 04:12, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

Agreed. People will come to this article looking for info on the Tesla angle. Censoring it is not the way to go - especially on Wikipedia. Present the theory but also present why it is probably not plausible. James 03:04, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

Agreed too. Tesla + Tunguska angle is clearly notable, regardless of how ridiculous it is. Alex Pankratov 05:30, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

New research from Sandia

There's some new research from Sandia National Labs regarding this event. Probably worth someone reviewing and including in the article. I don't see any evidence of this having been done yet. http://www.sandia.gov/news/resources/releases/2007/asteroid.html is the press release, but it gives the reference to the scholarly paper. --128.101.35.100 (talk) 16:27, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

The thing is that we already have sources for many pre-existing estimates of the size of the impactor. So then, once they actually publish their work, the question will be "has anyone else taken note of their theory?" Until we can answer "yes" to that question, it isn't really deserving of anything more than another value in the list of estimated sizes, if anything. However, I suspect the work may contain a useful review of earlier estimates, and perhaps a section on discrepancies of such can be hashed out. Someguy1221 (talk) 23:01, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

The press release from Sandia indicates that the work has been accepted for publication in a refereed journal (cited in the reference I put in), and it is also in a book of collected articles that is in press. I think acceptance in a refereed journal ought to be sufficient grounds for inclusion in an article, unless there is a policy against that (I confess I am a newbie editor). Otherwise we have to decide how much scholarly note, and by whom, is sufficient. Of course there are degrees of refereeing and "some journals are more equal than others", to paraphrase Animal Farm.

BTW, I learned of this yesterday (Pacific time) from David Morrison's occasional e-mail newsletter on asteroidal impact hazards, put out from NASA Ames Lab, where he is a senior scientist and a person well-known in the field. (The book is referenced in Morrison's newsletter, but I do not see it in the Sandia press release.) Based on all this I am going to re-instate my earlier edit on the Sandia result, hoping this is acceptable to all. Wwheaton (talk) 19:37, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

I'm going to hash it down almost completely though, it currently gives undue weight to the Sandia estimate. Without secondary sources on their estimate, we can't in good conscience give the impression that their estimate is more reliable than the others. Someguy1221 (talk) 20:08, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

To fully explain my reasoning here...My objection to including papers that haven't been published yet is merely that we don't actually know what's going to be in the paper, and press releases are generally poor sources of scientific information. That said, the underlying problem is one of how the information is presented, presuming it originates from a reliable source. We have several reliable sources giving different estimates on the size of the rock, and magnitude of the explosion. Since a study is not a reliable source for its own results, if all we have are primary sources for different estimates, neutral point of view prohibits us from making any one estimate appear more reliable than the others (and spending five times as text on one estimate than any other qualifies as such under the third paragraph of WP:UNDUE). If we have secondary sources discussing these estimates (like a review article in a reliable journal), however, then what you've produced is a reliable and independent source on the esitmate itself. This secondary source can be used to lend weight to a particular estimate. Alternatively, we could go back to the other sources provided for estimates, and create a new section that describes all estimates in detail (what they are, how they came about), being careful to not make one sound "better" than the others (unless we have a secondary source that says so). You've actually now tempted me to go and do that, but I would have to wait a few weeks to regain access to all of my journal subscriptions. Someguy1221 (talk) 20:23, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

OK, I think that's reasonable. In cumulative fields like the sciences I think there is maybe some ground for favoring a more recent (but refereed) result over older work, but this is not journalism, and I confess I was slightly uneasy about that aspect of my first edit on the subject. Wwheaton (talk) 20:59, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Natural gas explosion

Per my revising of the new "unexplained phenomena" section, I feel I should pre-emptively provide my reasoning here should anyone question it. The New Scientist article cited is very plainly a bad source of information, and I have removed what information could only be referenced to it. This article (a mere one page blurb) makes numerous claims without citation, without explaining who discovered/asserted it, or how the discovery or conclusion was made. This includes the broad assertion that no meteoric material was ever recovered (again, without citation or explanation), which contradicts numerous souces already in the article. As such, it would seem to be just the whims of one man, published in ignorance of a large body of research on the event. Further, Kundt never claims the "skyglows" preceded the explosion. He mentions "light nights" or "white nights" preceded the explosion (he actually makes this claim without any citation), and explicitly excludes the well documented skyglow from this phenomenon. Further, granting his work its own section titled "Unexplained Phenomena" might gives the sense that his assertions are common or widely accepted critisisms of the impact theory, which we have no evidence of; indeed, Google scholar lists only four citations to his paper (yet further, we have many sources supporting the mainstream theory that discuss much of what Kundt claims was inconsistent, with no indication they find it inconsistent). As such, it shouldn't be granted any more weight than the other speculative hypotheses, so I have moved it there. Someguy1221 (talk) 21:42, 30 December 2007 (UTC)

Time of the event

According to "The Mystery of the Tunguska Fireball" (2005, by Surendra Verma, published by Icon Books, Cambridge, UK) the event took place at 7:14 a.m. local time, not 7:40 as stated in this article. Obviously "7:40" could have arisen from a mis-hearing of "7:14" OR vice versa. Which one is correct? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.109.75.165 (talk) 22:28, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

The time was changed (and made to be inconsistent with other sections of the article) in october by an anonymous user without reference. Ideally, we should get a reliable source to cite the minute. Someguy1221 (talk) 22:35, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Tunguska explosion or explosions?

A witness by the name of Stepan Ivanovich, said: Suddenly, above the mountain, where the forest had already fallen, something started to shine intensely, and, I tell you, it was as if a second sun had appeared; the Russians would have said “something suddenly flashed unexpectedly”; it hurt my eyes, and I even closed them. It resembled that which the Russians call lightning. And immediately there were, loud thunder. That was the second thunderclap. ( see http://www.vurdalak.com/tunguska/witness/chuchana_si.htm )

How did Stepan Ivanovich see an area of flattened forest before he saw the flash of an explosion? It seems he was describing a second explosion. He states that there were many flashes and thunderings in differant locations. And other statements would tend to agree. Many statements mention the sounds of multiple exlosions. ((User Nosut)) 2:00, 19/1/2008. (UTC)