The devastating explosion that remained one of the great mysteries of humanity. Destroyed everything over a radius of 2,000 square kilometers

117 years ago, in Siberia, one of the most devastating contacts with a heavenly body in recent history took place. The resulting explosion destroyed everything over a radius of over 2000 square kilometers. This deflagration could have completely destroyed a large metropolitan area.

The planet Earth has been hit throughout its history troubled by numerous heavenly bodies with a decisive impact on the evolution of life on Earth. In the recent history of the Earth, that is, after the appearance of man, these incidents were rare. The most devastating and shocking for those who saw their effects was recorded on July 30, 1908, in Taigaua Siberia. A strong explosion, spent about 5 kilometers above the ground level, destroyed everything in a radius of over 2000 square kilometers. If the incident had happened in an intensely inhabited area, it is estimated that it would have killed everything in the way, the breath of the explosion being able to turn a large metropolitan area into ruins. It is not even known to this today what heavenly body has exploded above Siberia, leaving behind a mystery with many question marks.

An apocalyptic explosion that destroyed Trot on a 2000 -square -mile

On June 30, 1908, in the Russian province of Yeniseysk (today Krasnoyarsk Krai), near the Tunguska river in the Siberian taiga, an event was held that shocked the contemporaries. At 7:17 local time, the reindeer breeders in the Siberian tribes and the Russian colonists in the northwest area of ​​Baikal Lake observed a blue light, almost as bright as the sun, moving in the sky and leaving a thin river. Near the horizon, they saw a dazzling glitter that produced a surrounding cloud, followed by a pillar of fire that shed a red light on the entire landscape.

Ten minutes later, a strong thunder was heard, similar to a fire supported by artillery. The eyewitnesses closer to the explosion reported that the source of the sound moved from east to the north. The sounds were accompanied by a wave of shock that shot down people and broke the windows at houses within a radius of thousands of square kilometers. The shock wave destroyed several houses and shot down in a fraction of a whole forest. The trees were actually burned from the extreme heat released by the explosion and then extinguished by the shock wave and thrown to the ground. Being a very little populated area, only three deaths were recorded among the reindeer, natives of the Evenki tribes.

The explosion was recorded at seismic stations throughout Europe and Asia, and the shock wave was detected in countries such as Denmark, UK, Holland, Dutch Indies and even Washington DC. It is estimated that in some places the resulting shock wave was equivalent to a 5.0 -degree earthquake on the Richter scale. In the next few days, the night sky in Asia and Europe has shone. There are contemporary reports to the incident indicating that areas of Sweden and Scotland were illuminated at midnight, as during the day. The theory was issued that this sustained shine effect was due to the passage of light through the high altitude ice particles that had been formed at extremely low temperatures as a result of the explosion. It is a phenomenon that, later, was reproduced by space shuttles.

“The sky was split and the entire northern part was covered by fire.”

The incident near the Tunguska river took place during the reign of Russian Tsar Nicolae II. Without the media and computer systems today, the event was not taken very seriously, given that it had occurred in an isolated area, without consistent losses. In addition, Europe at that time was sitting on a powder barrel. On -site research was much delayed by war, political changes, new ideologies, social purges, but also by the fact that it was difficult to reach the area. Only after 20 years, a team of scientific researchers arrived in Tunguska to research the place of explosion.

Tunguska Mago Photo Eikipedia

“The Soviet Academy of Sciences for the first time to geologist Leonid A. Kulik in a place expedition in 1921, but the area proved so inaccessible that he could not reach it. Only in 1927 Kulik managed to reach his goal. Even though he had passed 19 years, the area still showed his explosion. He described an area of ​​destruction in the form of a butterfly of 830 square miles (2149 square kilometers), with about 80 million bloated trees.states the specialists from NASA, on their official website. Geologist Leonid Kulik also gathered some testimonies about this incident from eyewitnesses.

“At breakfast I was sitting next to the house in Vanavara. I suddenly saw that directly to the north, over the road from Tunguska in Okoul, the sky was split in two and the entire northern part was covered by fire. At that moment it was so hot that I could not bear as if my shirt had to be taken. A few meters back and I fell to the ground.confessed Semeonov, a local.

A mystery that has not been elucidated until today

Although several subsequent expeditions have been made and approximately 1000 specialized works and scientific articles were made on the Tunguska incident, until today it is not known exactly what has happened. Some suspect it was a comet, a meteorite or an asteroid. It is certain that it has exploded above the soil level, without impacting the terrestrial bark. One of shock was huge. NASA specialists believe that the heavenly body was an asteroid and exploded about 10 kilometers above the ground.

“The asteroid with an estimated diameter at 40 meters, had an entrance angle of about 30 degrees, based on the sky, and exploded at an altitude of about 9.6 kilometers. The shock wave and the resulting heat explosion is most likely with the reports of the eyewitnesses and with the damage described by Russia. From that place, they recorded the trepidations caused by the shock wave ”shows NASA. All those from NASA say that the asteroid was effectively vaporized from the explosion, the researchers discovering after 1930 only small fragments of extraterrestrial origin.