Meteors are normally quite an uncommon occurrence. And when they do happen, it's a spectacle, sure, but it's not really scary. It's more cool than anything, right? But, on Tuesday March 17, that didn't end up being the case.
As reported by CBS News, a 7-ton meteor travelling at 45,000 miles per hour blitzed through the sky. It hurtled through the air, passing by 10 states. As it passed, it made a really loud noise, which some eyewitnesses thought was an explosion. Pretty scary stuff if you were inside and couldn't look up, right?
Eyewitnesses described the crazy sight as like "a giant fireball". Pretty apt description, if you ask me. One person even said it shook their whole house!
Apparently, NASA said that the meteor fragmented while in the air, "resulting in a pressure wave". When it broke apart, it released 250 tons of TNT worth of energy. They also confirmed that it would've been loud enough to shake some homes like the eyewitness said it did.
Also, the National Weather Service officially notified that a meteor was coming early on Tuesday. They used a special instrument called a "geostationary lightning mapper". While it's usually used to map lightning, it can also detect meteors like it did.
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NASA Aren't Sure Where the Meteor Came From
While they could guess what happened to make the loud boom noise, they aren't too sure where in space it came from exactly.
Bill Cooke, the head of NASA's Meteoroid Environments Office, said that it wasn't clear. "This could just be a small asteroid that hung out in the belt and eventually migrated... or it could be a fragment from a larger one. We really don't know", he said.
But one thing's true - we'll find out soon. "Some fragments, some tiny pieces of it, actually made it to the ground.", Cooke continued. He charts meteors and other space objects - he's an expert in his field.
This comes after other meteors have been seen this year. CBS has reported that Ohio's skies saw another meteor on March 15. Also, another one was seen on someone's doorbell video camera in February.
While it's really cool to think about, the noise must have been something else. Did you hear it?
