A cherry tomato-sized meteorite smashes through his roof – and is 470 million years old

A few days ago we told you the incredible story of the meteorite that crashed through a roof in Alabama, ricocheted off a wooden radio, and struck Ann Hodges on the hip. Well, a similar, more recent tale has been unearthed in Georgia.

When a man in McDonough heard what sounded like a gunshot inside his home this summer, he probably didn’t expect to find a hole in his roof and his ceiling, and then discover a solid dent in his floor. What caused it? An ancient rock from outer space the size of a cherry tomato.

While insurance deductibles may have initially been more front of mind than the scientific interest behind it, it wasn’t long before the University of Georgia’s researchers, led by planetary geologist Scott Harris, got involved.

How old is the McDonough Meteorite?

After examining fragments weighing about 23 grams, Harris determined the meteorite to be a Low Metal (L) ordinary Chondrite, formed 4.56 billion years ago – which means it’s older than Earth! Speaking to UGA News, Harris explained that its path traces back to a massive asteroid collision in the main belt between Mars and Jupiter roughly 470 million years ago.

Some shards from that breakup eventually fell into Earth-crossing orbits. This one happened to meet a Georgia roof at precisely the wrong (or right, depending on your perspective) moment.

Could bigger meteorites cause real damage?

By the time the fireball entered the atmosphere, its speed was still extreme: about a kilometer per second. That’s like running 10 football fields in a single second. It was small, but powerful enough to pulverize part of the homeowner’s flooring into dust.

“This used to happen once every few decades,” Harris noted, but better sky-watching technology means we’re catching them more often. Here’s the man himself talking us through it.

The McDonough Meteorite now rests in UGA’s collections, with other pieces headed to the Tellus Science Museum. The homeowner, meanwhile, is still vacuuming up bits of the cosmos.

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