Image credit: Google Earth, NASA/JPL-Caltech › Larger view
From the WSJ (NASA JPL Statement follows):
The meteor that crashed to earth in Russia was about 55 feet in diameter, weighed around 10,000 tons and was made from a stony material, scientists said, making it the largest such object to hit the Earth in more than a century.
Large pieces of the meteor have yet to be found. However, a team from the Urals Federal University, which is based in Yekaterinburg, collected 53 fragments, the largest of which was 7 millimeters, according to Viktor Grokhovsky, a scientist at the university.
Data from a global network of sensors indicated that the disintegration of the Russia fireball unleashed nearly 500 kilotons of energy, more than 30 times the energy of the Hiroshima atomic bomb.
It is the largest reported meteor since the one that hit Tunguska, Siberia, in 1908, according to the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration. The agency’s new gauge of the meteor’s size was a marked increase from its initial estimate.
==============================================================
Here is the NASA JPL statement:
New information provided by a worldwide network of sensors has allowed scientists to refine their estimates for the size of the object that entered that atmosphere and disintegrated in the skies over Chelyabinsk, Russia, at 7:20:26 p.m. PST, or 10:20:26 p.m. EST on Feb. 14 (3:20:26 UTC on Feb. 15).
The estimated size of the object, prior to entering Earth’s atmosphere, has been revised upward from 49 feet (15 meters) to 55 feet (17 meters), and its estimated mass has increased from 7,000 to 10,000 tons. Also, the estimate for energy released during the event has increased by 30 kilotons to nearly 500 kilotons of energy released. These new estimates were generated using new data that had been collected by five additional infrasound stations located around the world – the first recording of the event being in Alaska, over 6,500 kilometers away from Chelyabinsk. The infrasound data indicates that the event, from atmospheric entry to the meteor’s airborne disintegration took 32.5 seconds. The calculations using the infrasound data were performed by Peter Brown at the University of Western Ontario, Canada.
“We would expect an event of this magnitude to occur once every 100 years on average,” said Paul Chodas of NASA’s Near-Earth Object Program Office at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. “When you have a fireball of this size we would expect a large number of meteorites to reach the surface and in this case there were probably some large ones.”
The trajectory of the Russia meteor was significantly different than the trajectory of the asteroid 2012 DA14, which hours later made its flyby of Earth, making it a completely unrelated object. The Russia meteor is the largest reported since 1908, when a meteor hit Tunguska, Siberia.
Source: http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/asteroids/news/asteroid20130215.html
Preliminary information indicates that a meteor in Chelyabinsk, Russia, is not related to asteroid 2012 DA14, which is flying by Earth safely today.
The Russia meteor is the largest reported since 1908, when a meteor hit Tunguska, Siberia. The meteor entered the atmosphere at about 40,000 mph (18 kilometers per second). The impact time was 7:20:26 p.m. PST, or 10:20:26 p.m. EST on Feb. 14 (3:20:26 UTC on Feb. 15), and the energy released by the impact was in the hundreds of kilotons.
Based on the duration of the event, it was a very shallow entry. It was larger than the meteor over Indonesia on Oct. 8, 2009. Measurements are still coming in, and a more precise measure of the energy may be available later. The size of the object before hitting the atmosphere was about 49 feet (15 meters) and had a mass of about 7,000 tons.
The meteor, which was about one-third the diameter of asteroid 2012 DA14, was brighter than the sun. Its trail was visible for about 30 seconds, so it was a grazing impact through the atmosphere.
It is important to note that this estimate is preliminary, and may be revised as more data is obtained.
http://www.nasa.gov/topics/solarsystem/features/asteroidflyby.html
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
agle@jpl.nasa.gov
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That’s what I love about WUWT full of real information. Science at it’s best with NO adjustments.
Keep it coming!
… so the large Dolphin pod run is from the meteor? Or is something else up? Maybe another impact at sea spooked them.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2280236/Mystery-group-100-000-dolphins-spotted-swimming-coast-San-Diego.html#ixzz2LEXDzV1G
That just might have been a leading trojan to the 2012 DA14, in the gravitational saddle on the lead size of the orbit, smaller so affected more by the tug of the Earth just enough to skim us into the atmosphere. Any confirmation there? Whew, close call, super lucky that one didn’t reach the surface!
10,000 tonnes seems a bit massive. kilos perhaps
Russia to create meteor (should be meteorite) defence shield.
http://english.ruvr.ru/2013_02_18/Russia-to-create-meteor-defense-shield/
Uninhabited oceans cover most of the earth’s surface. I estimate these events, large meteor strikes, are more frequent than being estimated. We generally know nothing about them, but we should assume they are at least three times more frequent than observed.
Hmmm….
Just like a Seinfeld episode, sometimes things just mesh together.
Feb 9: CNN’s Deborah Feyerick wonders if global warming is the cause of asteroid 2012 DA14
Feb 12: We have it from the highest office in the land that we have to believe in Climate Change because otherwise, we would be stuck believing in “freak coincidences”.
Feb 15: meteor hits Russia
Feb 16: asteroid 2012 DA14 passes near Earth
Feb 18: CNN declares “A meteor and asteroid: 1 in 100 million odds”
http://www.cnn.com/2013/02/16/opinion/urry-meteor-asteroid/index.html
Conclusion: Deborah Feyerick must have been right! Since we can’t believe in “freak coincidences”, something that seems to be improbable must have a CAUSE.
Can you think of anything being THE CAUSE other than global warming?
I didn’t think so!
John in NZ, re: the mass of the meteor
55 ft -> ~17 m -> ~2500 m^3
Density from http://www.meteorites.com.au/odds&ends/density.html is about 4 T/m^3
So 10 kT is about the right ballpark
OMG, I knew it was big…
It all makes the footage much more remarkable (we all get to see it and from many different angles). Those Russians sure are cool and laid back. I haven’t seen all the different films of it yet, but those I saw, no one shouted or stopped their cars. It seemed more like, “Oh, look at that. Interesting.”
Amazing stuff.
Thos alarmists wanting to blame CAGW can scream all they want to, it just makes them look stupid. Their panicking is getting tiring, anyway. I think most people looking at green are beginning to see red (pun intended).
Wayne,
No it came from the opposite direction.
Hi Grant.
Yeah. you are right. I did the calculation again just after I posted and came out with about 4T/m^3
Teach me to check before commenting.
The largest 2 chunks of space debris in the last 100 years hits Russia. What are the chances?
Peter Brown….years ago, when I lived in Ft. McMurray, some of us GUYS were into Astronomy and he was in Grade 11/12 at the time, and we would pick him up and take him out to where we setup our scopes and he used to just sit in his lawn chair and watch/grade etc the meteors!! Look like he made a career out of it!! Good for him!
And once again, this is why this is the #1 Science blog on the internets…
From the The American Meteor Society….
http://www.amsmeteors.org/2013/02/large-daytime-fireball-hits-russia/
The biggest asteroid to hit Earth on any given day is likely to be about 40 centimeters, in a given year about 4 meters, and in a given century about 20 meters. These statistics are obtained by the following:
Over at least the range from 5 centimeters (2 inches) to roughly 300 meters (1,000 feet), the rate at which Earth receives meteors obeys a power-law distribution as follows:
N(>D) = 37 D^-2.7
where N(>D) is the expected number of objects larger than a diameter of D meters to hit Earth in a year. This is based on observations of bright meteors seen from the ground and space, combined with surveys of near Earth asteroids. Above 300 meters in diameter, the predicted rate is somewhat higher, with a two-kilometer asteroid (one million-megaton TNT equivalent) every couple of million years — about 10 times as often as the power-law extrapolation would predict.
(http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v420/n6913/full/nature01238.html)
william Abbott says:
February 18, 2013 at 5:06 pm
“Uninhabited oceans cover most of the earth’s surface. I estimate these events, large meteor strikes, are more frequent than being estimated. We generally know nothing about them, but we should assume they are at least three times more frequent than observed.”
I can’t say that you are wrong, but there are an awful lot of installations scattered around the world by certain missile-paranoid nations looking for large, fast moving objects. One would think they would pick up 3 times as many “Gee-golly-whiz-whu-waz-DAT! Awwww… it just fell in the ocean so we’ll never know”s as are reported.
A fair question is; are you correct in your assumption but there is nothing reported (protects how much the paranoid nations are picking up) or are all the “Hey guys. you missed another one too small for your ‘scopes” getting passed on to the appropriate observers? Perhaps someone knows about non-military threats getting reported to academics or can say (without saying, of course) that more objects are hitting than are generally reported.
Amazing that it was completely unknown before impact
Not only did it come in from a different direction, it took a huge LEFT turn due to CAGW. It energy increased as the result of excessive amounts of CO2 in it’s path and the cyclical, cyclonical rotation of solar winds and the earths rotation. WE HAVE MEASURED IT and CO2 exacerbated the heating of the Hydrogen and CO2 is sincronisety (sp). I guess it just BLEW UP
Kudos to WUWT for the great coverage.
It’s gratifying to see NASA focused on real and relevant science versus Islamic outreach and the global warming gravy train.
About “meteor defense shields,” we do not have, and not in the near term, the capability of projecting sufficient momentum or accurately enough to defend against a meteorite, and certainly not enough to overcome the precautionary principle.
About forecasting, the nonexistent probability of a strike by 2012 AD-14 was well established shortly after its discovery. If, hypothetically, a STRIKE was probable, would the information have been released earlier or later. Consider the dilemma of hurricane forecasters, is the panic worse before or after the event and its warnings.
I evacuated Charleston, SC, for H. Hugo but not for H. David. H. Hugo followed me to Charlotte, NC, where my shelter was damaged more than my Charleston home. My Beneteau FIRST 235 at Charleston’s Brittlebank may have been the most seaward undamaged boat afloat.
Although coming from different directions, could the two recent asteroid pieces be part of a slightly more asteroid-populated orbit/domain around the sun?
Large pieces of the meteor have yet to be found.
Except on the Russian black market, if you know who to ask.
Meteor fast is an order of magnitude faster than missile fast. Low Earth Orbit speed is about 7 Km/s. I believe that the Chelyabinsk meteor speeds are reported in the 30,000 Km/s range.
John in NZ
It’s almost 1800 m³ assuming a 15 metre diameter sphere (the earlier estimate).
With 17 metres diameter it’s over 2500 m³ in volume. The density of rock varies widely (pumice floats!) but if it’s usually between 2500 kg/m³ and 3500 kg/m³ which’d put the meteorite at between 6250 and 8750 tonnes (megagrams); a little shy of the estimate. OTOH: If the meteorite were made of e.g. solid iron ore with a density of between 4.5 and 5.3 tonnes/m³, it’d have been over the estimate of 10,000 tons.