And its a Hit from this 7,000 ton meteorite

[thelerner]

They're calling this hit a coincidence on a day when a large mother asteroid is coming extremely close to us. Here's info on the meteor that hit Russia.

 

I fucking love science

5 hours ago

A large meteor has crashed into Russia's Ural mountains, injuring hundreds of people. The resulting shockwave blew out windows and rocked buildings. Fortunately, no large fragments hit populated areas.
It seems that the meteor itself burned up in the lower atmosphere, causing it to shatter into fragments. A 6m crater has been found at a lake near Chebarkul, where a large fragment is thought to have impacted.

Videos have been posted online, you can watch one of them here: http://bit.ly/Wuszna
<amazing video, how could you not have apocalyptic thoughts if you saw it live>
More info: http://bbc.in/YjG0FG

Note: this is not the asteroid projected to pass by Earth later today. That will still be passing us by and there is no chance of an impact. This meteor was much, much smaller.

Here's live info from Nasa on the big one: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/

Later on this year we may have a comet in our skies so bright it will outshine the moon. http://www.astronomynow.com/news/n1209/25comet/

I like it when the sky gets interesting .

Edited February 15, 2013 by thelerner

[Antares]

I like this video

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=endscreen&v=nsNPIyxwPlE&NR=1

[thelerner]

Hard to believe its just a coincidence that the Earth is hit by such a large meteorite the same day a really big one came so close to us. As I understand the big one passes us by twice a year, this year and til the early 2030's its at a much safer distance.

 

I wonder if asteroids have little partners that follow and/or orbit them? Ones too small for us to see and track.

 

From Reuters:

NASA estimated the meteor was 55 feet across before entering Earth's atmosphere and weighed about 10,000 tons.

It exploded miles above Earth, releasing nearly 500 kilotons of energy - about 30 times the size of the nuclear bomb dropped on the Japanese city of Hiroshima in World War Two, NASA added.

"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, California.

[Antares]

Russia seems to attract meteorites for ever. Hard to believe its just a coincidence that it exploaded above big city and not somewhere in the wild. But it was not so big and did not do much damage. Universe is huge and Earth is moving very fast indeed in the Universe. It is may be some celestial reminder to earthlings, but I dunno