Almost exactly 200 years later, something similar took place over the Chicago suburb of Park Forest. The meteor wasn’t seen by many eyewitnesses — it occurred near midnight — but it was captured by video cameras. As you’ll see in these movies, the meteor underwent several violent fragmentation events. It scattered hundreds of meteorites over an area of about 10 square miles (26 square kilometers).
A few minutes before midnight March 26, 2003, an object weighing as much as 15,000 pounds (6,800 kilograms) crashed into Earth’s atmosphere at a speed of 44,700 mph (72,000 km/h). Collisions with air molecules scorched the exterior, and soon it began to melt away, or ablate. At the same time, the meteor’s speed caused enormous pressure to build up in front of it, while a partial vacuum formed in its wake. A about 11 miles (18 km) altitude, this front-to-back pressure difference became so great the meteor exploded in a spectacular fireball.
Scientists estimate only 66 pounds (30 kg) of the original object made it to the ground as meteorites. Although this is bad for meteorite-hunters, it was a good thing for Park Forest. Had the meteoroid survived intact, it would have struck with a wallop equivalent to 600 pounds of TNT.
