Mysterious Giant Sphere Unearthed in Forest Divides Opinion

Re:Mysterious Giant Sphere Unearthed in Forest Divides Opinion by theophrastus on Sunday June 05, 2016 @02:13PM (#11842241)

If a nearly pure wad of space iron became molten on entering ancient earth's atmosphere and buried itself in relatively soft crust/clay, some sort of planetary "shot tower"[1] effect is out of the question? (and/or why no mention of "meteor"?)

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shot_tower

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Re:Mysterious Giant Sphere Unearthed in Forest Divides Opinion by dogma1138 on Sunday June 05, 2016 @02:39PM (#11842381)

Were talking about different velocities a shot tower works because the molten lead solidifies in the air, they travel at 50-100 m/s and land in water.

An Iron rod that falls from space will melt when hitting the ground just from the impact force regardless if it somehow managed to melt and solidify during reentry.

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Re:Mysterious Giant Sphere Unearthed in Forest Divides Opinion by Aelinsaar on Sunday June 05, 2016 @03:21PM (#11842599)

That much mass wouldn't bury itself, it would blow itself apart and leave a huge crater. It would be coming in at horrendous velocity, and the outer layers would flash to plasma on impact I think.

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Re:Mysterious Giant Sphere Unearthed in Forest Divides Opinion by hackaflocka on Sunday June 05, 2016 @02:35PM (#11842364)

Or it could have been a ball of molten iron (from a meteor) that splashed into water, turned into sphere, and eventually found its way to the surface.

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Re:Mysterious Giant Sphere Unearthed in Forest Divides Opinion by dogma1138 on Sunday June 05, 2016 @02:40PM (#11842387)

A ball of iron that size won't solidify into a sphere the sphere thing only works when the surface tension force is the big actor when something is that massive it's not longer the case.

This is why if you drip water from a bucket it would form drops but if you pour it all at once it wouldn't form one big drop.

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