Meteor Trail over Ohio - On the Heels of the HamSCI Workshop

[Gary Mikitin, AF8A]

In a case of irony on a meteoric scale, just days after presentations, posters and discussions on meteor scatter at the HamSCI Workshop, a multi-ton meteoroid entered the Earth's atmosphere near Cleveland, Ohio.  It did so in broad daylight, it was highly visible (where skies were clear) and it created a very loud sonic boom, heard over multiple states and one province.

The event has had extensive coverage in the media..  One such story is below, and beyond that, the HamSCI presentation on Meteor Scatter by Rob Suggs, NN4NT, is linked from the HamSCI Workshop pages.

One question:  Was anyone operating meteor scatter at the time (~1300 UTC on 17 Mar 2026)?  Rob looked through the PingJockey.com history and didn't find anything in those conversations,  but it's worth asking around just the same.

https://signalcleveland.org/meteor-sonic-boom-near-cleveland-northeast-ohio-march-2026/

https://hamsci.org/publications/meteor-scatter-science

 73 de Gary, AF8A

[Ron KF7ZN]

Thanks Gary

Have a nice day!

Ron Wilcox KF7ZN

RN, CCM

HamSCI/NASA Citizen Science

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[Kristina Collins]

Thanks for the links, Gary! It may indeed be that we were all tired out after travels back from the workshop, sleeping in and dreaming about meteors....

I was dozing at the time but am quite sure I heard it. I remember thinking "hmm, I'll probably wake up to an earthquake report later," and then rolling over and going back to sleep.

73 de KD8OXT

QTH CLE

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[Ethan Miller K8GU]

I missed it (and the workshop, sadly; could not justify the travel in
light of family activities)!

However, I did check the QRSS CW grabbers on 30 meters yesterday to
see if there was any signature of interest. At first glance, I did
not see anything. The hard target "head echo" would possibly have
shown up outside the QRSS passband (usually 100s of Hz wide) due to
the Doppler shift (supposing a velocity of 30 km/s, that's about
~1-kHz Doppler shift at 10 MHz). We commonly see aircraft echoes on
QRSS, but the geometry has to be pretty favorable for those to show
up. There was another bolide / fireball reported in NW OH and SE MI
at the end of January that I started analyzing in QRSS with intent to
show at the HamSCI meeting. The only signature I could find for that
one was a potentially anomalous occurrence of skywave propagation
between my location and WM9C in Illinois. Even then, it's a small
amount of material spread over a wide area...

73,

--Ethan, K8GU.

> To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/hamsci/CAEeerr4Gqg9AVfefqXBacafbp_7aMzt7GedpTYttLTWyb%2BZ4Yg%40mail.gmail.com.



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[Matthew Canel]

I was at work in Elyria (Lorain county) and not only did I hear it but is shook the building and sounded like an explosion right outside or on the rail line 100 feet from the parking lot. At least one car alarm was triggered.


73 de
Matthew Canel, KE8NZR

> On Mar 18, 2026, at 12:13 PM, Ethan Miller K8GU <et...@k8gu.com> wrote:
>
> I missed it (and the workshop, sadly; could not justify the travel in

> To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/hamsci/CAFkosZ%2Bz4sFyZtH0s4otY%2BfC1HJF76W%3DhqFC1vjT3X0WwrruQA%40mail.gmail.com.

[Philip Gladstone]

From the PSKReporter data, this was the MSK144 activity around the moment of impact. I can't convince myself that there is anything out of the ordinary (timestamp in UTC)

+----------------+---------------+------------------+-----------------+-----------+--------+---------------------+

| senderCallsign | senderLocator | receiverCallsign | receiverLocator | frequency | mode   | ts                  |

+----------------+---------------+------------------+-----------------+-----------+--------+---------------------+

| KE4TH          | DN40HL        | N5KO             | CM97AA          |  50260000 | MSK144 | 2026-03-17 12:49:00 |

| RW6HP          | LN14KA        | UN7MBV           | LO51RH82CM      | 144360000 | MSK144 | 2026-03-17 12:50:34 |

| WG0G           | EN35vb92      | KE8Y             | EN91ge80        |  50261515 | MSK144 | 2026-03-17 13:01:52 |

| WG0G           | EN35vb92      | W4IMD            | EM84AB          |  50261550 | MSK144 | 2026-03-17 13:01:53 |

| N0LL           | EM09os64      | NJ6D             | DM42LH          |  50261486 | MSK144 | 2026-03-17 13:04:30 |

| N0LL           | EM09os64      | KV7N             | DN22OV          |  50261505 | MSK144 | 2026-03-17 13:04:46 |

| UN7MBV         | LO51RH        | RW6HP            | LN14KA          | 144359970 | MSK144 | 2026-03-17 13:06:01 |

| KV7N           | DN22OV        | N0LL             | EM09os64        |  50261494 | MSK144 | 2026-03-17 13:07:13 |

| KN4MKX         | EM97RE        | WG0G             | EN35vb92        |  50261478 | MSK144 | 2026-03-17 13:08:00 |

| WG0G           | EN35vb92      | N0AN             | EN22XC          |  50261524 | MSK144 | 2026-03-17 13:08:30 |

| KK7MNC         | CN87WQ        | W7TXT            | CN87WO          |  50261505 | MSK144 | 2026-03-17 13:09:34 |

| WG0G           | EN35vb92      | KM0T             | EN13vb96        |  50261505 | MSK144 | 2026-03-17 13:09:37 |

| N0LL           | EM09os64      | KE4TH            | DN40HL          |  50261481 | MSK144 | 2026-03-17 13:09:49 |

| N0LL           | EM09os64      | WQ0P             | EM19WF          |  50261484 | MSK144 | 2026-03-17 13:10:30 |

| N0LL           | EM09os64      | W5TRL            | EM10NE          |  50261484 | MSK144 | 2026-03-17 13:12:47 |

| KV7N           | DN22OV        | N5KO             | CM97AA          |  50260000 | MSK144 | 2026-03-17 13:15:45 |

+----------------+---------------+------------------+-----------------+-----------+--------+---------------------+

Philip Gladstone

--

[googl...@cox.net]

I put in an inquiry to the person who runs the livemeteors.com web site to see if there are any recordings of the event. The detection system uses TV transmitters located in Canada (Ontario area) as the signal source, and has a receiver located in the DC Metro area.

 

73,

 

Mark Braunstein  WA4KFZ

Philip Gladstone

 

 

On Wed, Mar 18, 2026 at 11:12 AM Gary Mikitin, AF8A <gmikit...@gmail.com> wrote:

In a case of irony on a meteoric scale, just days after presentations, posters and discussions on meteor scatter at the HamSCI Workshop, a multi-ton meteoroid entered the Earth's atmosphere near Cleveland, Ohio.  It did so in broad daylight, it was highly visible (where skies were clear) and it created a very loud sonic boom, heard over multiple states and one province.

 

The event has had extensive coverage in the media..  One such story is below, and beyond that, the HamSCI presentation on Meteor Scatter by Rob Suggs, NN4NT, is linked from the HamSCI Workshop pages.

 

One question:  Was anyone operating meteor scatter at the time (~1300 UTC on 17 Mar 2026)?  Rob looked through the PingJockey.com history and didn't find anything in those conversations,  but it's worth asking around just the same.

 

https://signalcleveland.org/meteor-sonic-boom-near-cleveland-northeast-ohio-march-2026/

 

https://hamsci.org/publications/meteor-scatter-science

 

 73 de Gary, AF8A

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[David Kazdan]

From AD8Y in Cleveland Heights, just outside Cleveland to the east:

I think that my regular recording of CHU 7.85 MHz shows a signature of the strike, but it's hard to know.  It's a brief but intense signal enhancement.  The meteor approached from over Lake Erie in the direction of that transmitter from here, so it makes a certain amount of sense.  There is also an unusual spot in my recording of WWV 10 MHz but I think it's a few minutes too early, and it doesn't make a lot of sense to me that WWV from the west would be changed by a path and then strike overhead.

Is there a way to post graphics here?

David