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-Signs, Portents, and the Weather-
99 Years Ago Today: the Tunguska Event
2007-06-30
The Tunguska event, sometimes referred to as the Tunguska explosion, was a massive explosion that occurred near the Podkamennaya (Under Rock) Tunguska River in what is now Krasnoyarsk Krai of Russia, between 7:00 and 8:00 AM on June 30, 1908.

The explosion was most likely caused by the airburst of a large (around 20 m (66 ft) across) meteoroid or comet fragment at an altitude of 5 to 10 kilometers (3–6 mi) above the Earth's surface. . . . The energy of the blast was estimated to be between 10 and 20 megatons[1] of TNT, 1,000 times more powerful than the bomb dropped on Hiroshima, or equivalent to Castle Bravo, the most powerful nuclear bomb ever detonated by the US. . . .

The unofficial theme song of the Tunguska Event can be heard on a music video here.
Posted by:Mike

#7  James, the picture posted in BBC article is deceptive. The lake is actually rather more than less elliptic (2.2:1), it's longer side is oriented 90 degrees towards the reported object trajectory and is probably older than the event. There is a mentioning of a lake that fits the coordinates from 1879 in a surveyor's report that is located in Bratsk archives. There is another, smaller lake that is almost round, lying almost spot on the trajectory, about 8 miles NE from the event epicenter.
Posted by: twobyfour   2007-06-30 22:01  

#6  Well, they didn't have to exist back then.
Posted by: Halliburton Space-Time Transit Division   2007-06-30 21:21  

#5  I didn't know Halliburton existed back then.
Posted by: Gary and the Samoyeds   2007-06-30 19:31  

#4  Maybe there was a crater after all: BBC article
Posted by: James   2007-06-30 17:33  

#3  There was some speculation years ago, that it might have actually been something akin to a very high speed but tiny black hole, that actually passed through the Earth, exiting on the far side. This was based on some reports of a contemporary sighting of an immense "water spout" seen elsewhere.

But for their part, the Russians have obsessed over it for so long, doing countless studies of meteorite, asteroid, comet, and other impacts and airbursts, that that theory really faded into the background.
Posted by: Anonymoose   2007-06-30 16:10  

#2  Every schoolboy knows that "The Tunguska Event" was a Tesla experiment gone awry...
Posted by: borgboy2001   2007-06-30 15:58  

#1  Ididntdoitnobodysawmeyoucantproveanything!
Posted by: Abdominal Snowman   2007-06-30 12:48  

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