A meteorite crossed the night sky over Vermont on Sunday, March 7, creating a spectacle of lights and causing explosions that shook the Earth as it burned the atmosphere.
The explosive passage of the asteroid through the atmosphere released the equivalent of 440 pounds (200 kilograms) of TNT, Suggesting that the meteor was probably 10 pounds and 6 inches (15 centimeters) in diameter, according to the NASA.
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The space rock crashed into the atmosphere at about 68,000 kilometers per hour, NASA reported and appeared over the northern part of the state as a glowing fireball at 5:38 p.m., just before of the sunset.
A local news station reported calls from across the state after the event, and Vermont residents described a “loud rumble and vibration of body jerk” as the meteor passed over them.
According to eyewitness accounts, NASA estimates that the fireball first appeared 84 miles above the heritage forest of Mount Mansfield, east of Burlington, the state’s largest city.
It then advanced 53 miles northeast toward the Canadian border, disappearing 33 miles above the ground south of Newport City.
According to NASA, the shock wave was the result of the meteorite fracture due to atmospheric pressure.
As the piece the size of a bowling ball of a larger parent asteroid moved at almost 55 times the speed of sound through the atmosphere, pressure accumulated in front of it and a vacuum formed. behind him. Eventually, the voltage of this differential caused the rock to explode.