Scientists have managed to track down the origin of a fireball which exploded over Canada in February of last year. While Earth is no stranger to all kinds of space debris that falls into its atmosphere on a daily basis, fireballs are usually masked by daylight or occur over oceans and uninhabited regions.
The fireball from February, according to scientists, is not a typical kind of meteor. The object is believed to have originated in the Oort Cloud, which is far beyond the reach of Pluto’s orbit. According to NASA, the inner edge of the Oort Cloud is thought to be between 2,000 and 5,000 astronomical units (AU) from the sun. An AU is the distance between Earth and the sun (about 93 million miles).
While it’s not unusual for material from the Oort Cloud to be ejected and head toward the direction of our solar system, the fireball from February exploded in such a way that scientists believe the object was made of rock, and not a chunk of frozen ammonia, methane and water as is typically discovered to come from the Oort Cloud, otherwise known as a long-period comet.
"This discovery supports an entirely different model of the formation of the Solar System, one which backs the idea that significant amounts of rocky material co-exist with icy objects within the Oort Cloud," says Denis Vida, a physicist of the University of Western Ontario in Canada.
"This result is not explained by the currently favored Solar System formation models. It's a complete game changer."
Last year’s meteor was found to be around 10 centimeters (4 inches) across and weighed around 2 kilograms (4.4 pounds), and had the same burn and disintegration that is consistent with a rocky fireball. However, its trajectory matched the orbit of a long-period comet, leading researchers to question its origin and wonder how a rocky meteoroid could end up so far from its original home.
"We want to explain how this rocky meteoroid ended up so far away because we want to understand our own origins. The better we understand the conditions in which the Solar System was formed, the better we understand what was necessary to spark life," says Vida.
"We want to paint a picture, as accurately as possible, of these early moments of the Solar System that were so critical for everything that happened after."
According to the AMS, observers can expect to see just one fireball of a magnitude -6 or better for every 200 hours of meteor observation while a fireball magnitude -4 can be witnessed once every 20 hours. For reference: Venus at its brightest is gaged at a magnitude of -4.5, the full moon is a -12.6 magnitude, and the sun is a -26.7 magnitude.