Meteorites from fireball that rained down on Mississippi homes are being found, NASA says
Days after a fireball rattled Mississippi houses and was spotted in nearby states, NASA has confirmed fragments of the meteorite have been found in the Magnolia State.
The fireball was spotted Wednesday morning, Bill Cooke of NASA’s Meteoroid Environments Office previously told USA TODAY.
NASA said the fireball “generated an energy equivalent of 3 tons of TNT” and that it appeared 10 times brighter than the full moon at its peak before it disintegrated 34 miles above the swampy area north of Minorca, Louisiana.
On Saturday, NASA Meteor Watch said the number of eyewitness accounts had doubled, as the fireball actually traveled 35,000 mph, not the initially reported speed of 55,000 mph.
NASA added that meteorites were found in an area east of Natchez, on the Louisiana-Mississippi border.
U.S. law says any meteorite found on private property belongs to the owner of the property, so NASA wouldn’t disclose where the meteorites were found.
The group later shared a picture of a meteorite someone had found.
NASA suggested that if people in the area believe they have found a meteorite from the fireball, to alert a meteorite group at Washington University in St. Louis.
“We are not meteorite people, as our main focus is protecting spacecraft and astronauts from meteoroids,” NASA said. “So we will be unable to identify any strange rocks you may find - please do not send us rock photos, as we will not respond.”
There have been 1,878 verified meteorites in the United States from 1807 to August 2021, according to the Meteoritical Society. If the meteorite in Mississippi is verified, it would be the fifth recorded in the state, and the first since 2012, NASA said.