(COPY)
323 W. Tenth St.,
Pueblo, Colorado
February 20, 1948
Office of the Chief of Staff
U. S. Army
Washington, D. C.
Subject: Explosion in the sky near Norcatur, Kans.
4:00 p.m. (MST) February 18, 1948
Purpose: To call attention to some peculiarities
in connection, whether coincidental or not
According to an AP bulletin appearing in the Pueblo CHIEFTAIN
for February 18, 1948, some object was seen moving eastward
across the sky on the late afternoon of February 18th, and
when this thing reached a position approximate to Norcatur,
Kansas, exploded, or disrupted, or disappeared. The ex-
plosion is said to have been terrific.
Directions given as to the progress of this appearance in-
dicate that it moved from west to east.
Information contained in the dispatch under a Denver dateline
indicate that while many would call this object a bolide -
e.g., exploding meteor - the astronomers of Chamberlin
Observatory (Denver) did not so assess it: it is said in
the dispatch that these officials could offer no explanation
of it.
If this is the case, the apparance is anomalous, and may lend
itself to other meteoric explanation.
A sketch-diagram of the earth and moon's orbit reveals a pe-
culiarity in connection with the appearance, which may be
significant.
If a line is stricken at right-angles across the meridional
position of the site of explosion of this meteor at hour
angle four o'clock (local time) and this line be considered
the west-to-east course of the object, then it will be seen
that if this line is continued outward into space toward the
orbit of the moon it will intersect the lunar orbit at a
place near to where the moon would be at from 80 to one hundred
hours after the explosion took place.
New moon occurred at 9 D 10 H 2 M February; First Quarter
at 17D 8H M. February -- the moon moves approximately
12.5 degrees per day along its orbit.