Vasily and Lieberman
were two ordinary peasants, living near the 'Podkamennaya Tunguska
River,' in what is now called Krasnoyarsk Krai region of
Russia. They died in a most bizarre fashion on 30 June 1908; a day of
momentous consequences. They were about to begin their daily chores
in the morning and were taking their cattle herd for grazing, when
a strange event occurred. At exactly 7:14 AM. Local time or 00:14 UT
, they, along with some other peasants, saw a powerful fireball on
north horizon. Within few moments there was a blinding flash of
light, which appeared to be spreading to the entire sky along with a
deafening sound of an mega explosion. The intensity of this explosion
was so severe that the intense shock waves created by this explosion,
threw away both these peasants over a long distance and they died
almost instantly under the impact. However tragic their deaths were
for their families, their deaths normally would have not have been
included in the history of planet earth.
However, later when
it was known that the flash of light and the explosion was caused by
an meteorite falling on earth, their deaths got included in a long
list of living organisms, destroyed by asteroids on surface of earth.
Their names however have greater significance in this list. Because
they are the only recorded cases from this otherwise unknown list.
Today, site of 1908 Tunguska event, looks like this!
The disaster in
which these two innocent peasants had lost their life is known as
'Tunguska event' to scientific community and was actually a minor
event by the standards of meteorite destruction throughout the
history of earth. The meteorite had burnt it self off in mid air
itself and there was no impact as such. Even then, houses at
'Vanavara Trading Post' [65 Km south of the explosion site] had their
window glass shattered and the people were thrown on the ground. The
sound of the explosion was heard even at places, which were 600 Km
away from the blast site and within a circle of 30 Km radius from the
blast site, almost everything, including the trees was completely
flattened. According to scientists, the meteorite was a small one,
having a size not larger than 50 meters.
Now, more than 100 years since the Tunguska event, another meteorite has burst over Russia again. On 15th February 2013, at 0920 (0320 GMT), an object was observed above Chelyabinsk city in the Urals region of Russia which flew by at great speed and left a trail behind. In an instant, there was a blinding flash and as the falling meteor partially burned up in the lower atmosphere above the city, the morning sky lit up. Within two minutes, there were two explosions setting off a shockwave that smashed more than 40000 windows and left many people injured. As per latest reports, Russian interior ministry claims that more than 1200 people were wounded, three of them seriously and one still in coma, by the shockwave in Chelyabinsk and a half dozen other towns. The emergencies ministry said mobile communications were temporarily cut.
The
Chelyabinsk region is Russia's industrial heartland. It has a large
number industries and other huge facilities that include a nuclear
power plant and the massive Mayak atomic waste storage and treatment
center. No damage has been reported from any of the atomic
facilities. Yet State television showed a part of the roof and a
sheared off wall off a brick zinc factory in the city of Chelyabink.
Russian
astronomer Sergei Smirnov of the Pulkovo observatory estimated in an
interview with the Rossia 24 channel that the meteor "was quite
a large object with a mass of several dozen tonnes." Another
woman said on TV, "that only God saved me" from getting
hurt when the windows of her bedroom blew out. Most of the injuries
were because of the broken glass. "There was a very bright flash
and then two or three minutes later, we were knocked back by a shock
wave," a young man told on Rossiya state television. Another man
said "at first I thought it was a plane." Schools
were closed for the day across the region after the shock wave blew
out windows of buildings amid temperatures as low as minus 18 degrees
Celsius. The local post service said several of its buildings had
been damaged, while the stadium of Chelyabinsk's Traktor ice hockey
side was also hit, forcing the cancellation of a match.
Damage by the meteorite explosion
By
coincidence, an asteroid, designated as 2012 DA 14, brushed past the
earth by the narrowest of margins or a distance of around 27000 Km
from the Earth, just hours after this meteor exploded over Russia.
This 130,000 ton asteroid, which sped by earth, was about 150 foot
wide and this narrow miss is considered by scientists as the the
closest-known approach of such a large piece of cosmic debris since
space experts started tracking objects that intersect Earth's path.
Most of our Geo-stationary communication satellites like 'INSAT' are
placed at a distance of 36000 Km from earth. This asteroid, which
was big enough to destroy a major city, therefore actually was closer
to earth for a short interval of time, than even our INSAT
satellites. It however caused no damage to satellites also.
A hole found in an ice field after the
explosion. No debris was however found
There
has been some speculation that fall of meteorite over Russia and this
asteroid were somehow linked. Scientists however do not see any
connection between these two events and claim that it is just a
coincidence.
17
February 2013
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