Meteorite Ablation and High-Speed Emission Spectra in Plasma Wind Tunnel

View Video Presentation: https://doi.org/10.2514/6.2022-0265.vid

Meteorite samples have been tested in the plasma wind tunnel facility PWK1 with the aim of experimentally simulating the atmospheric entry of meteoroids, thereby reproducing ablation, melting, vaporization, and fragmentation of meteorites in the laboratory (ground testing) environment. These experiments were accompanied by optical diagnostic measurements to characterize fragmentation of meteorite samples, their temperature distribution and history, emission spectra, etc. The present work employed a novel high-speed emission spectroscopic setup developed for such ablation tests. This provides a meteorite emission spectral data set with simultaneous spatial, spectral, and temporal resolution. Comparison of data from meteorites of various types are presented with details on their spectral features, time history of radiance, and fragmentation pattern in a spectroscopic point of view.