What was the Tunguska Event?
The Tunguska event is the largest impact event in recorded history. It occurred in 1908 near the Tunguska river, in mideast Russia, an isolated area. It is thought to have been caused when a large meteoroid or comet 60-190 meters in diameter exploded approximately 5 to 10 kilometers (3 to 6 mi) above the ground. The Tunguska event flattened an area of forest over 50 km (30 mi) wide, felling over 80 million trees. At the epicenter of the blast, trees were left standing, but stripped of their bark and limbs. Because of the mysteriousness of the Tunguska blast — no meteroid was ever found — it has been the subject of various pseudoscientific theories about its origin, including the crash of an alien spaceship or an experiment carried out by Nikola Tesla. The scientific community is in consensus that the blast was likely caused by a meteor airburst. Various calculations involving the time of occurrence and angle of approach of the body suggest that the body came from the direction of the a
On June 30, 1908, a violent explosion occurred in the atmosphere over the Podkamennaya Tunguska River in a remote part of central Siberia. The blast’s consequences were similar to a hydrogen bomb explosion. It sent up a mushroom cloud, leveled thousands of square miles of forest, and wiped out a herd of reindeer. The shock of the explosion shattered windows 600 miles (960 kilometers) away. A number of theories have been proposed to account for this event. Some people thought that a large meteorite or a piece of antimatter had fallen to earth. (Antimatter is a substance that is the opposite of matter; it is believed that when matter and antimatter come into contact, they destroy each other.) However, a meteorite, composed of rock and metal, would have created a crater and none was found at the impact site. Nor were high radiation levels, which would have resulted from the collision of…
