What happens when a meteor hits the Earth?
About 50 tons of meteors enter the Earth's atmosphere every day, mostly dust-sized particles, but sometimes rocks several metres wide. Most of this material is burnt up as it hurtles through the atmosphere at speed of between 32 and 95 km/second (20-60 miles/sec), the blaze can be seen from the Earth as 'shooting' or 'falling' stars. Around 500 meteors a year are big enough, more than a centimetre or so wide, to survive the passage through the atmosphere and do it the Earth. At Meteor Crater in Arizona, United State, a hole 1.2 km (3/4 mile) wide and 170 m (600 ft) deep was blasted out by one such meteor about 20 000 years ago.

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