Human consequences
About 1,500 injured, mostly by broken windows: many had gone to the windows to look at the flash, brighter than the Sun.
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From spaceChelyabinsk meteor
0Deaths
Not quantifiedDisplaced / homeless
Not quantifiedEstimated cost
- No deaths, but about 1,500 injured, mostly by flying glass.
An asteroid about twenty metres across enters the atmosphere at more than 60,000 km/h and explodes some thirty kilometres up, releasing about 500 kilotons, some thirty times the energy of the Hiroshima bomb.
Consequences
Environmental consequences
A fragment of about 600 kg is recovered from the bottom of Lake Chebarkul. The dust plume circles the Northern Hemisphere in the stratosphere.
Economic consequences
About 7,000 buildings damaged in six towns; thousands of windows to replace in the middle of winter.
Political consequences
Filmed by hundreds of dashcams, the event gives new impetus to near-Earth asteroid detection and to an international warning network under UN auspices.
Further reading
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