Fireball

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Fireball is often used in reference to any large explosion or burst of fire.

Fireball can also refer to:

In science:

• A bolide, a meteor brighter than Venus (≈apparent magnitude -5). Fireballs frequently leave a trail which can be visible for several minutes (glowworms), and can sometimes produce a noise loud enough to be audible from the ground.
• In a nuclear explosion, the volume of air around the bomb that is heated to incandescence.
• A "primordial fireball," a term coined by P.J.E. Peebles to describe the universe during its first 300,000 years of existence. The fireball supposedly derived most of its energy from the annihilation of particles and antiparticles during the first second after the Big Bang.
• The hot volume that is created when large particles are collided together at an energy that is high enough to create quark-gluon plasma in Quantum chromodynamics.

In games:

• Fireball (pinball), a notable pinball machine released by Bally in 1972.
• A common magic (gaming) effect in fantasy role-playing games, especially Dungeons and Dragons; typically a magical grenade that explodes on impact.
• A colloquial term for any ranged projectile attack in a versus fighting game.
  • A hadouken, the original attack that gained the name, from Street Fighter II.
• A Fire Flower, which allows Mario and Luigi to shoot small fireballs in the Super Mario Bros. video games.

In engineering:

• The Ryan FR Fireball, a World War II-era United States aircraft made by the Ryan Aeronautical Company.
• Fireball (dinghy), a type of sailing boat.
• The McMaster Engineering Fireball, the official symbol of the Faculty of Engineering and the Engineering Society at McMaster University.

In fiction:

• Fireball XL5, a British television series made in the 1960s.
• Ball of Fire, a 1941 comedy film starring Gary Cooper.
• A major character in the animated television series Saber Rider and the Star Sheriffs.
• One of the "stalkers" from the movie The Running Man.
• A character in the British comic book Bullet (comic) (which was later absorbed into the comic Warlord) that was published during the 1970s.
• Fireball (Charmed), a fictional demonic power in the television show Charmed.

In music:

• "Great Balls of Fire," a song by Jerry Lee Lewis, and later a movie biography of Lewis.
• The Fireballs, a rock and roll band of the 1950s and 1960s, also known as Jimmy Gilmer and the Fireballs.
• Fireball (album), the sixth studio album released by the British hard rock band Deep Purple in 1971.
  • "Fireball (song)," a song on the album.
• Fireball Zone, an album from Ric Ocasek.
• Willis Fireball, a Fairbanks musician creating acoustic semi-extreme sport music.

Fireball can also refer to:

• Fireball Roberts, a highly regarded NASCAR driver.
  • The Fireball Run, an American road rally event named after Fireball Roberts.
• Atomic Fireballs, hot cinnamon-flavored hard candies.
• A Canadian cinnamon-flavoured whiskey.