Huge meteor over Russia

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Huge meteor over Russia

Postby Nordic » Fri Feb 15, 2013 5:01 am

http://rt.com/news/meteorite-crash-ural ... binsk-283/

Meteorite hits Russian Urals: Fireball explosion wreaks havoc, up to 500 injured (PHOTOS, VIDEO)
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Published: 15 February, 2013, 08:36
Edited: 15 February, 2013, 12:46
TAGS:
Natural disasters, Russia, Weather
Screenshot from YouTube user Gregor Grimm
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Russia’s Urals region has been rocked by a meteorite explosion in the stratosphere. The impact wave damaged several buildings, and blew out thousands of windows amid frigid winter weather. Hundreds are seeking medical attention for minor injuries.
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Eyewitness accounts of the meteorite phenomenon, handpicked by RT.
According to unconfirmed reports, the meteorite was intercepted by an air defense unit at the Urzhumka settlement near Chelyabinsk. A missile salvo blew the meteorite to pieces at an altitude of 20 kilometers, local newspaper Znak reports quoting a source in the military.
A meteorite is a solid piece of debris from space objects such as asteroids or comets, ranging in size from tiny to gigantic.
When a meteorite falls on Earth, passing through the atmosphere causes it to heat up and emit a trail of light, forming a fireball known as a meteor, or shooting or falling star.
A bright flash was seen in the Chelyabinsk, Tyumen and Sverdlovsk regions, Russia’s Republic of Bashkiria and in northern Kazakhstan.
Up to 500 people sought medical attention as a result of the incident, according to the Russian Interior Ministry. No serious injuries have been reported, with most of the injuries caused by broken glass and minor concussions.
At least one piece of the fallen object caused damage on the ground in Chelyabinsk. According to preliminary reports, it crashed into a wall near a zinc factory, disrupting the city's Internet and mobile service.
The Emergency Ministry reported that 20,000 rescue workers are operating in the region. Three aircraft were deployed to survey the area and locate other possible impact locations.
Witnesses said the explosion was so loud that it seemed like an earthquake and thunder had struck at the same time, and that there were huge trails of smoke across the sky. Others reported seeing burning objects fall to earth.

Police in the Chelyabinsk region are reportedly on high alert, and have begun ‘Operation Fortress’ in order to protect vital infrastructure.
Office buildings in downtown Chelyabinsk are being evacuated. Injuries were reported at one of the city’s secondary schools, supposedly from smashed windows.
An emergency message published on the website of the Chelyabinsk regional authority urged residents to pick up their children from school and remain at home if possible.
Those in Chelyabinsk who had their windows smashed are scrambling to cover the openings with anything available – the temperature in the city is currently -6°C.
Chelyabinsk regional governor Mikhail Yurevich is urgently returning to the region. Yurevich said that preserving the city’s central heating system is authorities’ primary goal.
“Do not panic, this is an ordinary situation we can manage in a couple of days,” the governor said in and address to city residents.
Background radiation levels in Chelyabinsk remain unchanged, the Emergency Ministry reported.

Local zinc factory was damaged the severest, some of its walls collapsing (Photo from Twitter.com user @TimurKhorev)

Screenshot from YouTube user Gregor Grimm
The regional Emergency Ministry said the phenomenon was a meteorite shower, but locals have speculated that it was a military fighter jet crash or a missile explosion.
“According to preliminary data, the flashes seen over the Urals were caused by [a] meteorite shower," the Emergency Ministry told Itar-Tass news agency.
The ministry also said that no local power stations or civil aircraft were damaged by the meteorite shower, and that “all flights proceed according to schedule.”
Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin, who also oversees the Russian defense industry, wrote on Twitter that he would speak with Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev about the incident in the Urals.
“On Monday I will bring to Medvedev a straight picture of what has happened in the Urals and prospective proposals of how the country can find out about the dangers approaching Earth and deal with them,” Rogozin wrote.
Residents of the town of Emanzhilinsk, some 50 kilometers from Chelyabinsk, said they saw a flying object that suddenly burst into flames, broke apart and fell to earth, and that a black cloud had been seen hanging above the town. Witnesses in Chelyabinsk said the city’s air smells like gunpowder.

Screenshot from YouTube user Gregor Grimm
Residents across the Urals region were informed about the incident through a cellphone text message from the regional Emergency Ministry.
Many locals reported that the explosion rattled their houses and smashed windows.

“This explosion, my ears popped, windows were smashed… phone doesn’t work,” Evgeniya Gabun wrote on Twitter.

“My window smashed, I am all shaking! Everybody says that a plane crashed,” Twitter user Katya Grechannikova reported.

“My windows were not smashed, but I first thought that my house is being dismantled, then I thought it was a UFO, and my eventual thought was an earthquake,” Bukreeva Olga wrote on Twitter.
The Mayak nuclear complex near the town of Ozersk was not affected by the incident, according to reports. Mayak, one of the world’s biggest nuclear facilities that used to house plutonium production reactors and a reprocessing plant, is located 72 kilometers northwest of Chelyabinsk.
It is believed that the incident may be connected to asteroid 2012 DA14, which measures 45 to 95 meters in diameter and will be passing by Earth tonight at around 19:25 GMT at the record close range of 27,000 kilometers.

Photo from Twitter.com user @varlamov
Another Tunguska event?

The incident in Chelyabinsk bears a strong resemblance to the 1908 Tunguska event – an exceptionally powerful explosion in Siberia believed to have been caused by a fragment of a comet or meteor.

According to estimates, the energy of the Tunguska blast may have been as high as 50 megatons of TNT, equal to a nuclear explosion. Some 80 million trees were leveled over a 2,000-square-kilometer area. The Tunguska blast remains one of the most mysterious events in history, prompting a wide array of hypotheses on its cause, including a black hole passing through Earth and the wreck of an alien spacecraft.
It is believed that if the Tunguska event had happened 4 hours later, due to the rotation of the Earth it would have completely destroyed the city of Vyborg and significantly damaged St. Petersburg.

When a similar, though less powerful, unexplained explosion happened in Brazil in 1930, it was named the ‘Brazilian Tunguska.’ The Tunguska event also prompted debate and research into preventing or mitigating asteroid impacts.
"He who wounds the ecosphere literally wounds God" -- Philip K. Dick
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Re: Huge meteor over Russia

Postby justdrew » Fri Feb 15, 2013 5:15 am

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Re: Huge meteor over Russia

Postby conniption » Fri Feb 15, 2013 5:56 am

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Re: Huge meteor over Russia

Postby justdrew » Fri Feb 15, 2013 6:22 am

looking at that video, it does kinda look like they may have hit it with something missile like
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Re: Huge meteor over Russia

Postby conniption » Fri Feb 15, 2013 6:23 am

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Re: Huge meteor over Russia

Postby Blue » Fri Feb 15, 2013 8:59 am

The Sound

From weather.com:

Vladimir Zhirinovsky, the nationalist leader noted for vehement statements, said "It's not meteors falling, it's the test of a new weapon by the Americans," the RIA Novosti news agency reported.



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(bad old embed code originally meant for old windows media player embeds of some sort. now removed from main posting screen.)
here's what was enclosed in old wonky embed tags:
http://bcove.me/9hzv9mdu
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Sorry that vid doesn't play here's the link:
Video Link: http://bcove.me/9hzv9mdu

Edited to add another vid with more SOUND

Last edited by Blue on Fri Feb 15, 2013 9:27 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Huge meteor over Russia

Postby 82_28 » Fri Feb 15, 2013 9:24 am

I most certainly hope this is not the case. But as I and others have brought up. this is one weird ass news cycle and I think it's going to continue. At like 11AM PDT the big one is supposed to pass Earth. Perhaps Alllegro can chime in, among others.
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Re: Huge meteor over Russia

Postby beeline » Fri Feb 15, 2013 9:59 am

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Re: Huge meteor over Russia

Postby Luther Blissett » Fri Feb 15, 2013 10:11 am

I wouldn't speculate on this anywhere else, but I think that the coincidence of this aligning with the asteroid DA14 flyby is astronomical. I suppose that the physical distance between these objects must have been millions of miles, and probably too far apart to be accompanying bodies. Most media seem to be hemming by opening with the statement that it's unequivocally not related to the asteroid before clarifying that the mineral deposits at the blast site will have to be studied before it can be determined.

Am I correct in saying that DA14 is not coming from the asteroid belt? I can't get a grasp on its orbit.
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Re: Huge meteor over Russia

Postby seemslikeadream » Fri Feb 15, 2013 10:43 am

http://www.space.com/19805-meteorite-crash-russia-injuries.html

"I would think that this is likely an exploding fireball (or bolide) event caused by the atmospheric impact of a small asteroid," Don Yeomans, head of NASA's Near-Earth Object Program, told SPACE.com. "If the reports of ground damage can be verified, it might suggest an object whose original size was several meters in extent before entering the atmosphere, fragmenting and exploding due to the unequal pressure on the leading side vs. the trailing side."
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Meteor Blast Rocks Russia

Postby Allegro » Fri Feb 15, 2013 11:47 am

Read what Phil Plait has to say about this on his Bad Astronomy blog here.
^ Final paragraph in this report by Jason Major.

See links in original.

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Meteor Blast Rocks Russia
Universe Today, Jason Major | 15FEB13



    This just in: reports of bright meteors and loud explosions have been coming from Russia, with the incredible video above showing what appears to be a meteor exploding in the atmosphere on the morning of Friday, Feb. 15.

    Image
    ^ A bright meteor witnessed
    over Russia on Feb. 15, 2013
    A bright meteor witnessed over Russia on Feb. 15, 2013

    According to Reuters the objects were seen in the skies over the Chelyabinsk and Sverdlovsk regions.

    “Preliminary indications are that it was a meteorite rain,” an emergency official told RIA-Novosti. “We have information about a blast at 10,000-meter (32,800-foot) altitude. It is being verified.” UPDATE: The Russian Academy of Sciences has estimated that the single 10-ton meteor entered the atmosphere at around 54,000 kph (33,000 mph) and disintegrated 30-50 kilometers (18-32 miles) up. Nearly 500 people have been injured, most by broken glass — at least 3 in serious condition. (AP)

    Chelyabinsk is 930 miles (1,500 km) east of Moscow, in Russia’s Ural Mountains.

    Preliminary reports on RT.com state that the meteorite “crashed into a wall near a zinc factory, disrupting the city’s internet and mobile service.” 150 minor injuries have also been reported from broken glass and debris created by the explosion’s shockwave.

    ADDED: More videos below:

    [Alert: the explosion is really loud.] Contrails and explosions can be heard here, with breaking glass:


    [Alert: the explosion is really loud.] Over a city commercial district:


    And yet another dash cam:


    Watch the garage door get blown in at the 30-second mark:


    Here’s a great summary from Russia Today


    This event occurs on the same day that Earth is to be passed at a distance of 27,000 km by the 45-meter-wide asteroid 2012 DA14. Coincidence? Most likely. But – more info as it comes!

    Read what Phil Plait has to say about this on his Bad Astronomy blog here.

    News source: Reuters. H/T to Matt Arnold.
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Re: Huge meteor over Russia

Postby Allegro » Fri Feb 15, 2013 12:16 pm

SpaceWeather dot com | 15FEB13

    RUSSIAN METEOR INJURES HUNDREDS: Ths morning, a meteor exploded in the daytime skies above Russia. According to CNN, hundreds of people were injured, mainly from the glass fragments of windows shattered by shock waves from the explosion. It is natural to wonder if this event has any connection to today’s record-setting flyby of asteroid 2012 DA14. NASA has issued the following statement:

      “The trajectory of the Russian meteorite was significantly different than the trajectory of the asteroid 2012 DA14, making it a completely unrelated object. Information is still being collected about the Russian meteorite and analysis is preliminary at this point. In videos of the meteor, it is seen to pass from left to right in front of the rising sun, which means it was traveling from north to south. Asteroid DA14’s trajectory is in the opposite direction, from south to north.” Stay tuned for updates!
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Re: Huge meteor over Russia

Postby Sepka » Fri Feb 15, 2013 12:29 pm

Luther Blissett wrote:Am I correct in saying that DA14 is not coming from the asteroid belt? I can't get a grasp on its orbit.



http://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/sbdb.cgi?sstr=2012+DA14;orb=1 shows the orbit. It's got a mildly eccentric orbit that takes it between Earth and Venus. Considering that it's also at an angle to the plane of the ecliptic, it was probably never a part of the asteroid belt to begin with.
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Re: Huge meteor over Russia

Postby FourthBase » Fri Feb 15, 2013 12:52 pm

Imagine how this kind of thing must have seemed to prehistoric humans. It must've blown their fucking minds. Well, a lot of stuff back then would've. But this is a little glimpse into the blown-mind of the humans who must have first invented gods like Jehovah and Zeus or their predecessors.
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Re: Huge meteor over Russia

Postby barracuda » Fri Feb 15, 2013 1:25 pm

Oh dear god in heaven, it's the end of the world zinc factory!

According to unconfirmed reports, the meteorite was intercepted by an air defense unit at the Urzhumka settlement near Chelyabinsk. A missile salvo blew the meteorite to pieces at an altitude of 20 kilometers, local newspaper Znak reports quoting a source in the military.


Is there any possible way this has a relationship to something that really happened?
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