Sikhote-Alin Meteorite

The Sikhote-Alin meteorite fell in 1947, in the Sikhote-Alin mountains in Russia (meteorites tend to be named after where they fell). This is quite a famous meteorite fall because of the large size & that it fell less than 100 years ago, meaning it could be properly documented when it happened – we even know that it impacted at 10:38am in the morning.

Sikhote-Alin Meteorite

As this meteor impact was so well documented & studied, we actually know that when it was around 3.5 miles from the Earth’s surface (this is actually closer to the Earth than aeroplanes fly!), the meteor blew up in an explosion, creating lots of smaller fragments that then impacted the Earth.

Being made up primarily of Iron (93%) and Nickel (5.9%) this is classified as an iron meteorite, when it fell the explosion was that powerful it could be seen over 180 miles away! Over 100 craters were left from the impact, with the largest being around 26 metres wide & 6 metres deep. The actual impact site is over 1.3km big.

Although this meteorite fell in 1947 its actually estimated to be around 1.7 billion years old