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Article: <5igb1r$q4p@sjx-ixn5.ix.netcom.com>
From: saquo@ix.netcom.com(Nancy)
Subject: Re: TUNGUSKA
Date: 9 Apr 1997 15:02:19 GMT
In article
<Forum.859842942.1957.richard.caldwell@OSF25.oklaosf.state.ok.us>
Richard Caldwell writes:
>> Sparks occur in the atmosphere due to friction between
>> moving air masses, the very thing that causes lightning
>> flashes. A large amount of methane gas wafting upward
>> along with the prevailing westerlies would stir the mix
>> unduly as methane is LIGHTER than air and thus would
>> create an inordinate number of UPDRAFTS. This spark
>> traveled along the wick of methane leading back to the
>> source.
>> ZetaTalk[TM]
>
> So, you are saying it was ignited from a single source.
> Sorry, no sale. Such a single-point ignition would lead to
> the cloud burning from one side to the other. ... Why
> would the burn spread around the periphery and not
> through the entire cloud? The only time the burn spreads
> around the periphery is when you have a cloud of pure fuel,
> like methane, that is mixing with the air at its periphery
> and, therefore, can only burn at the interface between the
> pure methane and the air. If it's already mixed with the air,
> it all burns together and the burning spreads sphyrically
> outward from the point of ignition.
> Richard Caldwell <richard.caldwell@OSF25.oklaosf.state.ok.us>
(Begin ZetaTalk[TM])
You are describing a small burn, a controlled burn that is out almost as soon as it is lit. Equate this not to
what it takes to set logs afire in your fireplace, but a forest fire. In your fireplace or even a campfire you
have a single updraft, and you look to contain the fire by watching sparks that float in the direction of this
updraft. In a forest fire the air is in turmoil, not only moving in an updraft but also outward as heated air
does from the fire, and in air turbulence there can be back drafts as cold air is sucked into the relative
vacuum created by recent super heating of air masses. Forest fires leap-frog about, jumping back and
forward and to the side with sparks and super heated air that in and of itself sparks fires.
THIS was the situation at Tunguska, where a vast stretch of land was layered with a thick methane and air
mixture, here more methane and there less throughout this cloud, so that parts were more prone to start
burning than others. A forest fire in the sky!
(End ZetaTalk[TM])