Claude Pruneau (WSU Physics). “The Perils of Asteroids.”
Dr. Claude Pruneau from Wayne State University gave a talk “The Perils of Asteroids.” Among other things, he talked about the Chelyabinsk meteor.
The Chelyabinsk meteor entered Earth’s atmosphere over the southern Ural region in Russia on 15 February 2013. It was a near-Earth asteroid that weighed about 10,000 tons. The object exploded in an air burst over Chelyabinsk Oblast, at a height of about 20 miles. The explosion generated a bright flash, producing a hot cloud of dust and gas, and many surviving small fragmentary meteorites.
The blast created by the meteor’s air burst produced extensive ground damage and numerous injuries. Most of the injuries were caused by the secondary blast effects of shattered, falling or blown-in glass. The intense light from the meteor, momentarily brighter than the Sun, also produced injuries, resulting in more than 180 cases of eye pain, and 70 people subsequently reported temporary flash blindness.