It was originally about the size of a car, and pieces were strewn across the Mexican state of Chihuahua. The Allende Meteorite fell to Earth in a fireball on February 8, 1969. The most famous are the Allende, the Fukang, Hoba, and the Willamette Meteorite. Over the course of Earth’s history, many meteorites (large and small) have fallen to our planet’s surface. For example, pallasite meteorites are a class of stony-iron meteorites that are made mostly of nickel and iron, but also contain olivine crystals (a commonly found crystal on Earth). Those three classes can be divided even further. Scientists classify these objects according to their chemical makeup (what chemicals exist in them), their isotopic compositions (the types of each chemical element they contain), and their mineralogy (the minerals they contain).īeyond those classifications, meteorites are also sorted as stony (made of rocky material), metallic (whether they contain iron), and mixtures (stony-irons). Meteorites are fragments of asteroids that fall to ground on Earth. An iron or stony iron was close to the core of an asteroid, while a stony object was closer to the surface. These compositions tell us where the meteoroid existed in its parent body.
If the object survives the trip and falls to Earth’s surface, it is known as a meteorite.
That causes it to glow, and if this happens at night, we see a long streak of light known as a meteor. These fragments may also be leftover comet debris, or were ejected in collisions between other solar system bodies such as the Moon or Mars.Īs a meteoroid travels through our atmosphere, it is heated by friction. Very small meteoroids (the size of dust) are often referred to as micrometeoroids or space dust. A small rocky or metallic chunk of material that travels through space is called a meteoroid. Most of the objects come from asteroids, which are objects made of various types of rock and have existed since the origin of the solar system. Most of the objects vaporize in our atmosphere, but some of the larger pieces (from pebbles to boulder-sized rocks) actually fall to the ground. Chondrit Meteorite – What is a Meteorite?Įarth is bombarded with millions of tons of space material each day.