Russian Meteor

From BBC:

"Meteor strike injures hundreds in central Russia"

A meteor crashing in Russia's Ural mountains has injured at least 500 people, as the shockwave blew out windows and rocked buildings. Most of those hurt suffered minor cuts and bruises but some received head injuries, Russian officials report.  A fireball was seen streaking through the clear morning sky above the city of Yekaterinburg, followed by loud bangs. President Vladimir Putin said he thanked God no big fragments had fallen in populated areas. A large meteor fragment landed in a lake near Chebarkul, a town in the neighbouring Chelyabinsk region. Much of the impact was felt in the city of Chelyabinsk, some 200km (125 miles) south of Yekaterinburg.  "It was quite extraordinary," Chelyabinsk resident Polina Zolotarevskaya told BBC News. "We saw a very bright light and then there was a kind of a track, white and yellow in the sky." "The explosion was so strong that some windows in our building and in the buildings that are across the road and in the city in general, the windows broke."  Officials say a large meteor partially burned up in the lower atmosphere, resulting in fragments falling earthwards. Thousands of rescue workers have been dispatched to the area to provide help to the injured, the emergencies ministry said. The Chelyabinsk region, about 1,500km (930 miles) east of Moscow, is home to many factories, a nuclear power plant and the Mayak atomic waste storage and treatment centre. Of 514 people injured in the Chelyabinsk region, 11 were being treated in hospital, the regional emergencies agency said in a statement. Mr Putin promised "immediate" aid for people affected, saying kindergartens and schools had been damaged, and work disrupted at industrial enterprises. Many children were at lessons when the meteor fell at around 09:20 (03:20 GMT).  Chelyabinsk resident Sergei Serskov told BBC News the city had felt like a "war zone" for 20 to 30 minutes. "I was in the office when suddenly I saw a really bright flash in the window in front of me," he said. "Then I smelt fumes. I looked out the window and saw a huge line of smoke, like you get from a plane but many times bigger." "A few minutes later the window suddenly came open and there was a huge explosion, followed by lots of little explosions."

A Russian army spokesman said a crater 6m (20ft) wide had been found on the shore of the lake.

The Russian Academy of Sciences estimates that the meteor weighed about 10 tonnes and entered the Earth's atmosphere at a speed of at least 54,000 km/h (33,000mph). Such meteor strikes are rare in Russia but one is thought to have devastated an area of more than 2,000 sq km (1,250m) in Siberia in 1908.

^ It feels like those disaster movies you see on TV. Luckily, people were only wounded and not killed. ^

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-21468116