On the Mass Distribution of Fragments of an Asteroid Disrupted in the Earth’s Atmosphere

Abstract

To model the interaction with the atmosphere of fragments of a disrupted asteroid, which move independently of each other, it is necessary to know their mass distribution. In this regard, an analogy is drawn with fragmentation in high-speed impact experiments performed to simulate the disruption of asteroids at their collisions in outer space. Based on the results of impact experiments and assuming a power law for the mass distribution in a differential form, we obtained the cumulative number of fragments as a function of the fragment mass m normalized to the total mass of fragments, the mass fraction of the largest fragment(s), the number of the largest fragments, and the power index. The formula for the cumulative number of fragments of a disrupted body is used to describe the results of impact experiments for different fragmentation types. The proposed fragment mass distribution is also tested by comparison with the mass distributions of recovered meteorites in the cases of Mbale, Bassikounou, Almahata Sitta, Košice, and Chelyabinsk meteorite falls.