The consequences of meteorites of various diameters falling to the ground. The largest meteorites that fell to earth. What year did a meteorite fall to earth?

Meteorites have fallen to earth countless times. There were also those that could completely erase the very fact of the existence of dinosaurs. But the events took place so long ago that it is not possible to find the remains of these cobblestones.

Meteorite Tsarev

In December 1922, residents of the Astrakhan province were able to observe a stone falling from the sky: eyewitnesses said that the fireball was enormous in size and made a deafening noise in flight.

Afterwards there was an explosion, and then it started raining stones. The next day, farmers living in that area found fragments of stones of a strange shape and appearance in their fields.


A total of 82 chondritic meteorites were found, with debris scattered over an area of ​​25 km2. The largest fragment weighs 284 kg, and the smallest is only 50 grams.

Goba meteorite

The largest intact meteorite in the world is the Goba meteorite: it is located in Namibia and is a block weighing about 60 tons. The surface of the meteorite is iron without any impurities.


Only dinosaurs could have observed Goba's fall to Earth: it fell on our planet in prehistoric times and was buried underground for a long time, until in 1920 it was discovered by a local farmer while plowing a field.


Now the site has been given the status of a national monument, and anyone can see it for a small fee. It is believed that when it fell it weighed 90 tons.

Allende meteorite

The meteorite fell to Earth on February 8, 1969 in the Mexican state of Chihuahua - it is considered the largest carbonaceous meteorite on the planet, and at the time of its fall its mass was about five tons.


Today, Allende is the most studied meteorite in the world: its fragments are stored in many museums around the world, and it is notable primarily for the fact that it is the oldest discovered body in the Solar System, the age of which has been accurately determined - it is about 4.5 billion years old.

Sikhote-Alin meteorite

On February 12, 1947, a huge block fell in the Ussuri taiga - the event could be observed by residents of the village of Beitsukhe in the Primorsky Territory: as always happens in the case of a meteorite fall, witnesses spoke of a huge fireball, the appearance and explosion of which was followed by a rain of iron fragments, fell over an area of ​​35 km².


The meteorite did not cause significant damage, but it made a number of craters in the ground, one of which was six meters deep. It is assumed that the mass of the meteorite at the time of entry into the Earth's atmosphere ranged from 60 to 100 tons: the largest of the fragments found weighs 23 tons and is considered one of the ten largest meteorites in the world.

Tunguska meteorite

On June 17, 1908, at seven o'clock local time, an air explosion with a power of about 50 megatons occurred in the area of ​​the Podkamennaya Tunguska River - this power corresponds to the explosion of a hydrogen bomb.


The explosion and the subsequent blast wave were recorded by observatories all over the world, huge trees on an area of ​​2000 km² from the supposed epicenter were uprooted, and not a single intact glass was left in the houses of residents. After this, for several more days the sky and clouds in this area glowed, including at night.

Asteroids that in the future may approach the Earth at a distance of 7.5 million km are considered potentially dangerous to the Earth. Our planet has collided with these cosmic bodies more than once. Today we will talk about how dangerous it is for an asteroid to fall to Earth and is there a possibility of a large-scale catastrophe in the foreseeable future? First, a little historical background.

An asteroid (from Greek “like a star,” “star”) is also called a minor planet. It is a celestial body whose size exceeds 30 km. Some of them have their own satellites. Many asteroids travel through our solar system. 3.5 million years ago, a huge number of asteroids fell on Earth, which led to global changes.

Traces of an ancient asteroid

In the spring of 2016, geologists in Australia discovered traces of an asteroid impact, the diameter of which was about 30-40 km. That is, it is comparable in size to a small satellite. The fall caused an 11-magnitude earthquake, a tsunami and widespread destruction. It was probably one of the asteroids, as a result of which not only the beginnings of life were formed on earth, but also the entire diversity of the biosphere.

There is also an opinion that the mysterious disappearance of dinosaurs occurred due to the fall of a large asteroid to Earth. Although this is just one of many versions...

This is interesting! The ancient impact was formed as a result of an encounter with a meteorite. Its depth once reached 20 km. The meteorite impact caused a tsunami and climate change similar to a nuclear winter. In addition, the temperature on Earth could drop by 26 degrees for up to 16 years.

Chelyabinsk meteorite

The fall of an asteroid to Earth in February 2013 became one of the most discussed incidents not only in Russia, but throughout the world. The asteroid, whose mass reached 16 tons, partially burned up in the Earth’s atmosphere, but a relatively small part of it fell near Chelyabinsk, fortunately, flying over it.

That year it flew over the Ural city, which served as the basis for its name. The body itself turned out to be quite ordinary and consisted of chondrites, but the time and place of its fall aroused interest. None of the asteroids that fell to Earth caused such damage, since they did not fall so close to a densely populated area. The meteorite's mass was 6 tons. Falling into the lake caused broken glass in 7,000 buildings. 112 people were hospitalized with burns, and several more people turned to doctors for help. In total, the shock wave covered 6.5 thousand square meters.

The enormous damage caused by the asteroid could have been much more significant if the celestial stone had fallen not into the water, but onto land. Fortunately, the fall of the asteroid to the earth did not turn into a large-scale disaster.

What is dangerous about a large meteorite falling to Earth?

According to scientists' calculations, the fall of an asteroid to Earth can lead to enormous damage if a body about 1 km in size falls onto the Earth's land. First of all, a funnel with a diameter of approximately 15 km will form, which will cause dust to enter the atmosphere. And this, in turn, can lead to large-scale fires. Dust, heated by the sun, will reduce ozone levels, speed up chemical reactions in the stratosphere, and reduce the amount of sunlight reaching the surface of the planet.

Thus, the consequences of an asteroid falling to Earth are very serious. The global temperature of the Earth will drop by 8 0 C, causing an ice age. But to lead to the extinction of humanity, the asteroid would have to be 10 times larger.

Giant danger

Scientists recently found out that centaurs should be included in the list of potential threats to our planet - these are giant asteroids with a diameter of 50 to 100 km. The gravitational field of other planets throws them towards our Earth every 40-100 thousand years. Their number has now increased sharply. Scientists are constantly calculating whether a giant asteroid will fall to Earth in the near future, although calculating the trajectory of the fall of the centaurs is a very difficult task.

In addition, the list of potential threats to the Earth includes:

• supervolcanic eruption;
• global pandemic;
• asteroid impact (at 0.00013%);
• nuclear war;
• ecological catastrophy.

Will an asteroid hit Earth in October 2017?

The main question that worries scientists at the moment is the danger posed by an asteroid, the size of which is 2 times larger than the Chelyabinsk meteorite. There is a possibility that an event will occur in October 2017 that will cause a disaster on a much larger scale than the 2013 strike. Astronomer Judith Rees claims that the asteroid's diameter reaches 40 km. It was dubbed object WF9.

A dangerous celestial body was discovered by scientists in Hawaii back in 2012. That year it passed at a very close distance from the Earth, and on October 12, 2017 it will approach the most dangerous distance for our planet. Scientists believe that if an asteroid actually hits Earth, the British will be the first to see it.

At the moment, scientists are actively studying the possibility of a collision. True, the probability of an asteroid falling to Earth is very small and, according to researchers, is 1 in a million. However, it still exists.

Constant danger

It should be noted that certain asteroids of different sizes are constantly flying past the Earth. They are potentially dangerous, but very rarely actually fall to Earth. So, at the end of 2016, a body flew past the Earth at a distance of 2/3 of the distance from a small truck.

And January 2017 was marked by the passage of a celestial body reaching the size of a 10-story building. It flew within 180 thousand km of us.

Astrophysicists from Canada claim that the mass of the stream of meteorites bombarding our long-suffering planet exceeds 21 tons per year. But in most cases this goes unnoticed, since a person can observe and find meteorites only in the habitable zone.

The share of land on the Earth's surface is only 29%; the rest of the planet is occupied by the World Ocean. But even from this 29% it is necessary to take away places that are not inhabited by humans or are completely unsuitable for habitation. Therefore, finding a meteorite is a great success. However, there was a case when a meteorite itself found a person.

The case of a meteorite colliding with a person

In the entire history of celestial bodies falling to Earth, only one officially documented case of direct contact of a meteorite with a person is known.

It happened in the USA on November 30, 1954. A four-kilogram meteorite broke through the roof of a house and injured the owner’s leg. This means that there is still a risk that a more serious guest from outer space could fall on people’s heads. I wonder what the largest meteorite fell on our planet?

Meteorites are divided into three categories: stony, stony-iron and iron. And each of these categories has its own giants.

The largest stone meteorite

Relatively recently, on March 8, 1976, space presented the Chinese with a gift in the form of stones falling to the surface of the earth for 37 minutes. One of the fallen specimens weighed 1.77 tons. It was the largest meteorite that fell to earth, having the structure of a stone. The incident occurred near the Chinese province of Jilin. The space guest received the same name.

To this day, the Jilin meteorite remains the largest rock meteorite discovered on earth.

Largest ironstone meteorite

The largest representative of the category of iron-stone meteorites weighed 1.5 tons. It was found in 1805 in Germany.

A fellow German meteorite, found in Australia, weighed only 100 kg less than the German one.

But everyone was surpassed by the iron guest from space, whose weight was tens of times greater than all previously found meteorites.

Largest iron meteorite

In 1920, an iron meteorite with a diameter of 2.7 meters and weighing over 66 tons was discovered in southwestern Namibia! A larger specimen than this has never been found on our planet. It turned out to be the largest meteorite to fall to Earth. It was named after the Goba West farm, whose owner came across it while cultivating a field. The approximate age of the iron block is 80 thousand years.

Today it is the largest solid block of natural iron.

In 1955, the largest meteorite that fell to earth, Goba, was declared a national monument and taken under state protection. This was a necessary measure, since over the 35 years that the meteorite was in the public domain, it lost 6 tons in mass. Part of the weight was lost as a result of natural processes - erosion. But numerous tourists made the main contribution to the “weight loss” process. Now you can approach the celestial body only under supervision and for a fee.

The meteorites mentioned above are, of course, the largest in their category ever discovered. But the question of which largest meteorite fell to earth remained open.

The meteorite that killed the dinosaurs

Everyone knows the sad story of the extinction of dinosaurs. Scientists are still arguing about the cause of their death, but the version that a meteorite was the culprit of the tragedy remains the main one.

According to scientists, 65 million years ago the Earth was hit by a huge meteorite, which caused a catastrophe on a planetary scale. The meteorite fell on the territory that now belongs to Mexico - the Yucotan Peninsula, near the village of Chicxulub. Evidence of this fall was the impact crater found in 1970. But since the depression was filled with sedimentary rocks, they did not carefully examine the meteorite. And only 20 years later scientists returned to study it.

As a result of the work, it turned out that the crater left by the meteorite has a diameter of 180 km. The diameter of the meteorite itself was about 10 km. The impact energy during the fall was 100,000 Gtv (this is comparable to the simultaneous explosion of 2,000,000 of the largest thermonuclear charges).

It is assumed that a tsunami was formed as a result of the meteorite impact, the wave height varied from 50 to 100 meters. The dust particles raised during the impact tightly blocked the Earth from the Sun for several years, which led to a sharp climate change. and periodic large-scale fires aggravated the situation. An analogue of nuclear winter has arrived on the planet. As a result of the disaster, 75% of animal and plant species became extinct.

Nevertheless, officially the Chicxulub meteorite is the largest meteorite that fell to earth 65 million years ago. He practically destroyed all life on the planet. But in history it ranks only third in size.

First among the giants

Presumably 2 billion years ago, a meteorite fell on Earth, leaving a mark 300 km in diameter on its surface. The meteorite itself supposedly had a diameter of more than 15 km.

The crater left after the fall is located in South Africa, in the Free State province, and is called Vredefort. This is the largest impact crater, and was left by the largest meteorite that fell to Earth in the entire history of our planet. In 2005, the Vredefort Crater was listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The largest meteorite that fell to Earth did not leave a photo as a souvenir, but a huge scar in the form of a crater on the surface of our planet will not allow us to forget about it.

It has been noted that the fall of meteorites, the size of which is measured at least tens of meters, occurs with a periodicity of hundreds of years. And larger meteorites fall even less frequently.

According to scientists, a new guest wants to visit Earth in 2029.

Meteorite named Apophis

The meteorite that threatens our planet was named Apophis (that was the name of the snake god, who was the antipode of the sun god Ra in Ancient Egypt). It is not known for certain whether it will fall to Earth or miss and pass near the planet. But what happens if a collision does occur?

Scenario of Apophis colliding with Earth

So, it is known that the diameter of Apophis is only 320 meters. When it falls to Earth, there will be an explosion equal in power to the 15,000 bombs dropped on Hiroshima.

If Apophis hits the mainland, an impact crater will appear, having a depth of 400-500 meters and a diameter of up to 5 km. The resulting explosion will destroy permanent structures at a distance of 50 km from the epicenter. Buildings that do not have the strength of a brick house will be destroyed at a distance of 100-150 km. The column of dust will rise to a height of several kilometers and then cover the entire planet.

Stories spread by the media about nuclear winter and the end of the world are too exaggerated. The size of the meteorite is too small for such consequences. The temperature may drop by 1-2 degrees, but after six months it will return to normal. That is, the predicted catastrophe, if it does happen, will be far from global.

If Apophis falls into the ocean, which is more likely, a tsunami will occur that will cover coastal areas. The height of the wave will depend on the distance between the shore and the location of the meteorite fall. The initial wave can be up to 500 meters high, but if Apophis falls in the center of the ocean, then the wave reaching the shore will not exceed 10-20 meters. Although this is also quite serious. The storm will continue for several hours. All these events should be considered only as possible with some degree of probability. So will Apophis collide with our planet or not?

The probability of Apophis falling to Earth

Apophis will theoretically threaten our planet twice. The first time - in 2029, and then - in 2036. After conducting observations using radar installations, a group of scientists completely ruled out the possibility of a meteorite colliding with the earth. As for 2036, today the chance of a meteorite colliding with the Earth is 1:250,000. And every year, as the accuracy of calculations increases, the probability of a collision decreases.

But even with this probability, various options for forcing Apophis to deviate from course are being considered. Apophis is thus an object of interest rather than threat.

In conclusion, I would like to note that meteorites are severely destroyed when entering the earth’s atmosphere. When approaching the Earth, the speed of the fall of guests from space is 10-70 km/sec, and upon contact with a gaseous atmosphere, which has a fairly high density, the temperature of the meteorite increases to critical, and it simply burns up or is very badly destroyed. Thus, the atmosphere of our planet is the best protector against uninvited guests.

Planet Earth is constantly exposed to dangers because there are asteroid belts nearby. According to scientists, there are about 17 thousand dangerous objects near the planet, and their fall to Earth can cause serious problems for the planet's population.

Our planet has a powerful gravitational field, and the fall of a meteorite on it is reduced to zero, but scientists never exclude this possibility. Scientists have discovered that asteroids may still fall on Earth next year.

Researchers analyzed the information and compiled a list of meteorites that may threaten our planet. According to experts, 90 celestial bodies will fly past the Earth in the new year and 13 of them have become a threat to the Earth.

The first ones to approach the Earth in January are “306383 1993 VD” and “2003 CA4”. Also, quite large asteroids are expected in February, these are the 400-meter “2015 BN509” and the 100-meter “2014 WQ202” and most of the celestial bodies will fly near our planet in May and November.

But the greatest danger is posed by the asteroid “2015 DP155”, which will fly by early in the morning of June 11, 2018. It always moves in the outer orbit of Mars, but once every two hundred years it moves closer to the sun. Therefore, it will not be difficult for him to approach the Earth. It is still quite large in size, about 280 meters, in order to completely burn out in the earth’s atmosphere.

According to researchers, there are a lot of large asteroids in the solar system, and all of them pose a danger to our planet, reports the Rosregistr portal. According to experts, collisions of large celestial bodies with each other also pose a danger to the Earth's population. According to them, particles will enter the atmosphere and will leave ozone holes, this will lead to high levels of direct sunlight hitting the surface.

Scientists say that a collision between Earth and an asteroid is a very rare occurrence. Huge cataclysms on our planet have happened several times throughout the history of mankind. One of the most powerful cataclysms is the fall of a meteorite, which destroyed dinosaurs and some other representatives of the earth's fauna. There was also a case of a meteorite falling in Ancient Egypt, but it was mentioned only in the chronicles.

The likelihood of a person dying from a collision between the Earth and an asteroid or other celestial body can be compared to dying in a car accident. And yet it will depend on the size of the celestial body. That is, if we are talking about a sufficiently large object, then it will only affect one continent.

This means that there can be no talk of any apocalypse. A meteorite falling into the ocean poses a great danger to the world's population. In this case, this cataclysm can cause a tsunami, and this in turn will cause enormous destruction. According to experts, the likelihood of asteroids and comets colliding with oceans and seas is much higher than with the earth’s surface.

Our planet is surrounded by a huge number of different celestial bodies. Small ones, when falling to Earth, go unnoticed, but the fall of larger ones, weighing up to several hundred kilograms and even tons, leaves various consequences. Scientists from the Canadian Astrophysical Institute in Ottawa claim that a meteorite shower with a total weight of more than 20 tons hits the Earth's surface every year. The weight of individual meteorites ranges from several grams to tons.

(23 photos of meteorites + video)

The largest meteorites that fell on Earth

On April 22, 2012, a celestial body appeared near the surface of the Earth, moving at tremendous speed. Flying over the US states of Nevada and California, scattering hot particles, the meteorite exploded in the sky over Washington. The power of the explosion was about 4 kilotons of TNT, which is almost eighty times less than the power of the explosion. Research by scientists has established that the Sutter Mill meteorite was formed during the formation of the solar system.

A year has already passed since February 2012, when hundreds of meteorite rocks fell over an area of ​​100 km in China. Eyewitnesses still remember this extraordinary event. The largest meteorite found weighed 12.6 kg.

Near Lake Titicaca in Peru, in the fall of 2007, a meteorite fell, which eyewitnesses observed as a falling body engulfed in fire. The fall of the meteorite was accompanied by a loud noise, reminiscent of the sound of a falling plane.

At the crash site, a crater 6 m deep and 30 m in diameter formed, from which a fountain of hot water burst out. The consequences of the meteorite fall are still felt by local residents.

Most likely, the celestial body contained toxic substances; 1,500 people living in the area closest to the crash site suffer from severe headaches.

In the summer of 1998, a meteorite fell near the Turkmen city of Kunya-Urgench, which received the name of the city. The fall of the celestial body was accompanied by a bright light. At the site where the largest meteorite fragment (weighing 820 kg) fell, a five-meter crater formed. Fortunately, no local residents were injured; the meteorite fell on a cotton field.

Scientists have established the age of the Turkmen meteorite - more than 4 billion years, this is the largest among the stone meteorites that fell on the territory of the CIS. Among all the known stone meteorites that fell to Earth, Kunya-Urgench is the third largest. Stone meteorites most often fall to Earth, their share is almost 93% of all types of celestial bodies that fell on the planet. The Chelyabinsk meteorite, according to the first estimates of scientists, was iron.

Meteorite Sterlitamak, 1990

On the night of May 17, 1990, a celestial body weighing 315 kilograms fell 20 kilometers from Sterlitamak. The meteorite, called Sterlitamak, left a crater with a diameter of 10 meters at the site of its impact on a state farm field. The largest fragment was not found immediately, but only a year later, at a depth of 12 meters. Nowadays it is an exhibit of the Museum of Archeology and Ethnography. The meteorite, weighing 315 kilograms, has dimensions of 0.5x0.4x0.25 meters.

In March 1976, the largest shower of rock meteorites in history occurred in the Chinese province of Jilin. The fall of cosmic bodies to Earth continued for 37 minutes, the speed of the fall reached 12 kilometers per second. About a hundred meteorites were found, the largest of which was named Jilin (Girin), weighing 1.7 tons.

In the winter of 1947, a meteorite fell in the form of iron rain in the Far Eastern Ussuri taiga in the Sikhote-Alin mountains. Having fragmented in the atmosphere as a result of the explosion, the meteorite turned into many fragments that fell over an area of ​​10 sq. km. In places where the debris fell, more than 30 craters were formed, from 7 to 28 m in diameter, up to 6 m deep.

About 27 tons of meteorite debris were found over a vast area.

The largest meteorite currently known to science is called Goba. An iron giant with a volume of 9 cubic meters and weighing almost 66 tons fell to the surface of the Earth in prehistoric times. After lying on Earth for approximately 80,000 years, in 1920 the meteorite was found in Namibia.

The Goba meteorite is the heaviest of all cosmic bodies that has ever hit the surface of our planet. It consists mainly of iron. Now it is the largest piece of naturally occurring iron on Earth. It still lies in Namibia, southwest Africa. Since its discovery, the meteorite has lost almost 6 tons in weight as a result of scientific research, erosion and vandalism. Now it weighs 60 tons.

The mysterious Tunguska meteorite is considered one of the most studied on the planet, but continues to remain the most mysterious phenomenon of the beginning of the last century. On June 30, 1908, in the early morning, a giant fireball flew over the territory of the Yenisei River basin. Over an uninhabited taiga region, the object exploded at an altitude of 7-10 km. The blast wave circled the globe twice and was so powerful that it was recorded by all observatories in the world.

The power of the explosion of the Tunguska meteorite is equal to the energy of the most powerful hydrogen bomb - 40-50 kilotons. The space giant, presumably weighing from 100 thousand tons to 1 million tons, rushed at speeds of tens of kilometers per second.

The blast wave felled trees over an area of ​​more than 200 sq. km, and window panes were broken in houses. Within a radius of 40 kilometers, animals died and people were injured. After the explosion, an intense glow of the sky and clouds was observed over a vast area for several days.

The answer to the question: what was that? - still no. If the fireball was a meteorite, then a gigantic crater with a depth of at least 500 m should have appeared at the crash site. But in all subsequent years it was never found. The Tunguska meteorite remains a mystery of the 20th century. The celestial body exploded in the air, the consequences were colossal, and no remains or debris were ever found on Earth.

Meteor shower, USA, 1833

On an autumn November night in 1833, a meteorite rained over the United States. Within 10 hours, meteorites of various sizes fell on the surface of the Earth, the total number of which exceeded 240,000. The source of this phenomenon was the most powerful of the currently known meteorite showers, which is called the Leonids.

About two dozen meteorite showers pass near the Earth every day. Scientists know about 50 comets that theoretically have the potential to cross the Earth's orbit. About once every ten years the Earth collides with relatively small cosmic bodies. Despite the fact that the movement of celestial bodies has been quite well studied and predicted, the next collision of a meteorite with the surface of the Earth is always a mysterious and surprising phenomenon for most of the planet's inhabitants.

HD Video of Meteor Shower