​On Sunday, February 12, the Hungarian astronomer Krisztian Sarnecki would discover another asteroid. Nothing special so far, Sarnetsky has already detected more than 300 asteroids from the Konkoli Astronomical Observatory in Budapest, but this was no ordinary asteroid: its trajectory seemed to lead it to collide with Earth! Fortunately, the asteroid, originally named Sar2667, was about 1 meter in diameter, which meant that even if it headed for Earth, it would burn up almost entirely on its way through the atmosphere.

On February 13, just 7 hours after its discovery, around 03:00 UTC, the asteroid (renamed 2023 CX1) entered Earth’s atmosphere at 14.5 km/s somewhere over the English Channel, putting on a spectacular show. those who managed to observe it. And there were not many of them, because the moment of re-entry was calculated based on Sarnetsky’s observations. The asteroid heated up and much of it burned up, visible from Britain, France, Holland or northern Spain. However, not all of the asteroid burned up when passing through the atmosphere! A few fragments survived and were found by a group of explorers between the towns of Dieppe and Dudeville in Normandy. To date, 7 fragments have been recovered from the former asteroid 2023 CX1.

Perhaps it is time to clarify the terms used: if an object is in open space, in orbit around the Sun, and arrives somewhere between Mars and Jupiter, it is an asteroid. At the moment when it enters the Earth’s atmosphere, due to its high speed, the asteroid heats up, and we say that it is a meteor or a bolide. Only if its fragments are found on Earth, we can say that we are dealing with a meteorite.

It was the 7th asteroid discovered hours before entering the Earth’s atmosphere (the first such space object was discovered in 2008). This is extremely useful for researchers because we have additional data on the origin of the meteorite left behind, we know its trajectory in space before it disintegrates in the Earth’s atmosphere. We don’t yet know the type of meteorite, but the first images seem to indicate that it is a chondrite (a type of meteorite that looks like rock on Earth but has a high iron and nickel content). We need to wait for the results of the first analyzes to say exactly what type of meteorite fell in Normandy.

It must be said that such asteroid strikes are a completely normal phenomenon and occur several times a year. NASA estimates that there are about 1 billion asteroids several meters in diameter, but as we have seen, they do not cause material damage when they collide with Earth. However, not all of these asteroids fall into the Earth’s atmosphere above populated areas, and if we also take into account the fact that more than 70% of the Earth’s surface is covered by water, it becomes obvious that the restoration of possible fragments is not always possible.

Another bolide unrelated to 2023CX1 was seen from southern Italy on February 14, but unlike the one over the English Channel, the object causing it was not detected before it became visible on to the sky There are some news reports that debris has been found in the city of Matera (some even from a home balcony), but it remains to be seen if this is a real meteorite.

Still unrelated to these two events, another bolide was spotted on Wednesday, February 15, over the US state of Texas, after which a fragment weighing more than 500 grams was recovered from the same area, which appears to be from this bolide. The explosion recorded over Texas was equivalent to 8 tons of TNT, and the diameter of the asteroid was less than 1 meter.

Currently, more than 70,000 meteorites are known and cataloged, more than half of which have been discovered in Antarctica, where the specific environment favors their preservation and identification.

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Photo source: profimediaimages.ro