A powerful blast rocked the Russian region of the Urals early on Friday with bright objects, identified as possible meteorites, falling from the sky, emergency officials said."It was definitely not a plane," an emergency official told Reuters, without elaborating. "We are gathering the bits of information and have no data on the casualties so far."No one was hurt in a meteor shower, an emergency official told RIA-Novosti. Local residents said they witnessed burning objects in the sky of the Chelyabinsk and Sverdlovsk regions.A Reuters witness in Chelyabinsk reported hearing a huge blast early in the morning and feeling a shockwave in a 19-storey building in the town center.The sounds of car alarms and breaking windows could be heard in the area, the witness said, and mobile phones were working intermittently."Preliminary indications are that it was a meteorite rain," an emergency official told RIA-Novosti. "We have information about a blast at 10,000-meter (32,800-foot) altitude. It is being verified."The trace from a falling object could be seen in Yekaterinburg, some 200 kilometers (125 miles) southeast of Chelyabinsk, another Reuters witness said.
Lots of crazy, amazing videos out there. Apparently an airburst or strike on Chelyabinsk, reports of a zinc factory being damaged and over 100 injured. Some on Twitter are saying it would have come from the wrong direction for a companion object of DA14.As far as air defenses shooting it down, I'm not sure how that would even be possible. Maybe a Russian equivalent of that Air Force 747 with the laser in the nose? But I'm not sure shooting at it just to break it up into more pieces that hit the ground would be advisable.
There's a thread over in space Science, but I think it might be prudent to merge or move that thread to general or live event, because this could be an event. Especially if they find fragments or the like.
Any ideas about what sort of size this was? Smaller than Tunguska?