Last weekend, when two loud explosions suddenly rang out in the Northeastern New England region of the United States, causing houses to shake and pets to scatter in fear, social media exploded in response.
“Did anyone else hear that loud noise?” “Did anyone feel the tremors?”
According to a report by the Associated Press, the culprit behind the commotion was revealed by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) to be a meteor. On Monday (June 1st), the agency revealed even more startling details.
It was disclosed that the meteor fireball was the size of an elephant, with a diameter of up to 5 feet (approximately 1.52 meters), and it entered the Earth’s atmosphere at a speed of 42,000 miles per hour (about 67,592.5 kilometers per hour). NASA estimated that on last Saturday, this fireball disintegrated several miles high over New England, releasing energy equivalent to about 230 tons of TNT explosive, which caused the thunderous booms.
On Monday, NASA posted a message on social media showcasing the astonishing details along with other relevant observational data.
According to NASA, the meteor was naturally formed, not a man-made satellite or space debris. After flying approximately 26 miles (about 41.8 kilometers) in the atmosphere, it finally landed in Cape Cod Bay, off the southeastern coast of Massachusetts.
NASA quickly pointed out that meteor events are actually quite common but typically do not attract such a large audience like this one did.
“Meteor falls generally occur over oceans or remote areas where there are few witnesses, and sometimes they happen during the day, making them hard to detect,” NASA said.
The meteor event on Monday initially sparked widespread speculation. The falling meteor accompanied by the shocking loud noises led some residents of Massachusetts and Rhode Island to mistakenly believe there was an earthquake or trees falling. Some people shared that their pets were frightened and distraught. At least one person even suggested the possibility of alien visitation.
A resident of Peabody, Massachusetts, mentioned that on the day of the incident, strong winds made him initially think a large tree had fallen on his house. He described how as he stepped outside, most neighbors were gathered on the street, all asking each other the same questions.
Steve Sobie, a spokesperson for the United States Geological Survey (USGS), confirmed that many residents had submitted witness reports to the agency and reported the tremors they experienced to the National Earthquake Information Center.
On the US National Earthquake Information Center website, there is a page for reporting “Did You Feel It?” due to the large number of reports, the center specifically opened an event page related to this meteor fall. However, Sobie stated that their seismic instruments did not record any earthquake, indicating that the vibrations were not caused by an earthquake.
Robert Lunsford, a project coordinator at the American Meteor Society, stated that the society received dozens of reports from areas ranging from Delaware to Montreal, where witnesses heard two loud noises, felt ground shaking, and some even saw the fireball streak across the sky.