The meteorite crashes in the house of Georgia, turns out to be 20 million years older than the earth

On a clear day of June in Georgia, a flamboyant fire ball suddenly fell from the sky above the Atlanta metropolitan region. The source of this show was a 1 -ton meteor that exploded in the air, sending a fragment of the size of a cherry tomato which pulls through the roof of a McDonough house.

Although nobody knew it at that time, this space rock was from an era before the earth is formed. Using optical and electronic microscopes, geologists from the University of Georgia analyzed 0.8 ounces (23 grams) of fragments recovered from the room that torn the house on June 26. Their study revealed that this meteor probably had more than 4.56 billion years. It is 20 million years more than our planet.

“This particular meteor which has entered the atmosphere has a long history before going to McDonough’s ground, and in order to fully understand that, we must in fact examine what the rock is and determine which group of asteroids it belongs,” said Scott Harris, a geology researcher from the University of Georgia, in a press release.

Harris and his colleagues extrapolated the age of the meteor by classifying the recovered fragments. The composition of the debris indicated that it came from ordinary low -metal chondritis, a group of asteroids in the main belt between Mars and Jupiter. Experts believe that they arise from a much larger asteroid rupture that occurred about 470 million years ago, Harris said. While these meteors orbit the sun, they sometimes cross the orbit of the earth, he said.

This is what allowed this intruder to unravel through the atmosphere of the earth and finally a house of Georgia without distrust. According to the version of the UGA, the researchers timed the meteor entering the atmosphere at cosmic speed, which is faster than the speed of sound. Indeed, people have largely pointed out sound booms along the track on the ground of the Fire Boule, which traveled northeast to the southwest to the site of its landing accident, the NASA meteoroid environment states.

The meteor 3 feet wide (1 meter) has disintegrated – or exploded – 27 miles above Wake Forest, in Georgia, triggering an energy explosion equivalent to around 20 tonnes of TNT, according to the NASA All Sky Fire Balls. When a pebble size fragment struck the roof of a McDonough man, Harris suspects that he heard three things at a time.

“One was the collision with his roof, one was a small cone of a sound boom, and a third was that he has an impact on the ground at the same time,” he said. “There was enough energy when he hit the ground for spraying part of the material in literal dust fragments. The resident told Harris that he still found space dust around his living room, according to the press release.

The meteorite the size of cherry tomatoes, officially named McDonough Meteorite, is the 27th recovered in Georgia in history and only the sixth documented fall. “This is something that expected once every few decades and not several times within 20 years,” said Harris. “Modern technology in addition to an attentive audience will help us recover more and more meteorites.”

The MCDONOUGH meteorite will remain at UGA for more in -depth analysis, and Harris plans to publish an article on its composition, speed and dynamics. These details will help scientists understand the potential threat of larger and more dangerous asteroid impacts. “One day there will be an opportunity, and we never know when it will be, for something to strike and create a catastrophic situation. If we can protect ourselves, we want it,” said Harris.