It’s not often a large meteorite comes flying through our atmosphere and it’s even more rare to see one fall within a populated area, but that’s exactly what happened in Chelyabinsk Russia. The meteorite sped across the sky at 19 miles per second in a ball of fire as it broke apart high up in the air. The incredible speed of the meteorite caused a large sonic boom that did significant damage to windows and even some buildings just before a large piece of the once 10 ton meteorite landed in a nearby lake. Over a thousand people were injured, mostly due to broken glass.
This does bring attention to the fact that we are essentially helpless when it comes to space rocks hitting Earth. Although we are getting better at detecting near Earth objects, it’s crucial that we continue to research ways in which to protect ourselves. As for now, we will just have to hope that if anything is headed our way that it hits an unpopulated area. The good news is that, although at times it may not seem like it but the Earth is largely unpopulated and there are vast regions of land and ocean where meteorites are far more likely to land. It’s also likely that meteorites, like the one that fell in Chelyabinsk, have fallen many times before but were never seen by anyone.
This has all happened just as 2012 DA14, a much larger meteorite than the one that just hit Russia, was on track to come within just 17,500 miles of Earth. That distance puts 2012 DA14 within the geosynchronous ring of our planet and that means it’s closer to Earth than many of our satellites. Experts say that 2012 DA14 is in no way a part of the meteorite that landed today, it’s purely a coincidence. 2012 DA14 has already passed Earth by this time and is actually heading away from our planet. This is a good thing considering that id 2012 DA14 were to land on Earth it would cause massive localized damage.
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