On a formulation of meteor physics problems

The general equation describing the motion of a meteoroid in the Earth’s atmosphere is considered. It is shown that, in this case, the momentum variation of the system consisting of the meteoroid and its separating mass is due to the velocity variation of the meteoroid. The projection of Newton’s equation onto the tangent to the meteoroid trajectory is analyzed. It is also shown that, because of large geocentric velocities (between 11 and 72 km/s), the dominant force is the drag force proportional to the square of the incident air flow velocity. Some numerical results obtained for the Bene>sov bolide registered by the European Fireball Network (May 7, 1991) are given as an illustrative example.