Chelyabinsk meteor: Ten years on from ‘wake-up call’, how safe are we from a potentially catastrophic strike?
It wasn’t quite the day the Earth stood still, but those who witnessed a fiery asteroid briefly outshine the sun as it soared towards the Russian city of Chelyabinsk will almost certainly never forget it.
Comparable to the size of a house and travelling at a scintillating 11 miles per second, what was quickly dubbed the Chelyabinsk meteor arrived unannounced in a manner reminiscent of a science-fiction disaster film. It was an unnerving spectacle.
Dashcam footage from the morning of 15 February 2013, in the central Russian city close to the Ural Mountains, shows the small asteroid entering the Earth’s atmosphere before it exploded with 30 times more force than the US atom bomb that destroyed Hiroshima in the Second World War.
Windows shattered, buildings were damaged, and hundreds of people were injured – but Chelyabinsk got lucky.
“Had it been directly over the city, the damage would have been worse,” warns NASA‘s planetary defence officer Lindley Johnson. “It was definitely a wake-up call.”
‘We’ve never seen anything like it since’
Working with partners like the European Space Agency, Mr Johnson’s department warns of any impacts to Earth by comets and asteroids and guides the response.
A standard test case was a “shooting star” asteroid that soared above the English Channel this week, which was tracked and publicised in advance, so people could see it for themselves.
Chelyabinsk was no standard test case.
“We’ve never seen anything like it since we started working in this area,” says Mr Johnson, whose office inside the US space agency was only established in 2016.
“It was daylight, clearly visible in the daytime sky, and that doesn’t happen very often.
“It came in on the daylight side of Earth, and we had no chance of being able to detect it ahead of time with the ground-based observatories that we used to find these objects at that time.”
The point of impact of the meteor
What are the chances of another Chelyabinsk?
Mr Johnson was in Vienna, Austria, on the day of Chelyabinsk’s arrival, attending meetings of UN members of the Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space.
It didn’t take long for recommendations on how to protect the Earth from such events to be endorsed, including an international asteroid warning network.
Professor Alan Fitzsimmons, of Queen’s University, Belfast, is an expert in these so-called near-Earth objects, and a committed member of the “planetary defence community”.
“We’re very open about what we find and our current state of knowledge about potential impact risks,” he says. “All asteroids that are detected are announced on public websites.
“Technology has come a long way in terms of how well you can detect asteroids, even as small as Chelyabinsk, but there’s still the chance that one could sneak through. And it’s quite likely that the next significant asteroid we have would be unannounced.”
The shockwave damaged buildings and smashed windows
Fragments of the meteor were collected
How are we protecting ourselves?
Chelyabinsk was considered a small asteroid – that and its arrival during daylight is why it was hard to see coming.
“We’re still vulnerable to those that are coming from the sun,” admits Mr Johnson.
“Most of these objects come from a main belt of asteroids out between Mars and Jupiter, and when they’re coming inbound into the inner solar system, we can find them in the night sky. But when they loop around the sun and come back out, that’s when we’re vulnerable.”
The key to being able to expect the unexpected, he says, is space-based observation.
NASA is working on the $1.2bn (£985m) Near-Earth Object (NEO) Surveyor for launch in 2028, which will be the first space telescope specifically designed to hunt asteroids and comets that may be potential hazards to Earth.
Even then, Chelyabinsk was far smaller than the asteroids NEO will focus on. Amy Mainzer, NEO Surveyor’s principal investigator, says it will prioritise “finding the one asteroid that could cause a really bad day for a lot of people”.
Also in the repertoire is the Double Asteroid Redirection Test (Dart) spacecraft. During testing last year, it was deliberately crashed into an asteroid and successfully altered its orbit.
An illustration of NASA’s DART spacecraft on a collision course with the asteroid Dimorphos. Pic: NASA/Johns Hopkins APL
What if another one gets through?
Chelyabinsk’s arrival showcased the importance of quick and effective communication – its arrival was rapidly documented around the world, Russian scientists shared their findings, fragments have been collected, studied, and found new homes, and the event informed international policy.
Prof Fitzsimmons says such transparency and coordination would again be vital, perhaps even more so in an age where misinformation can quickly spread.
Were such an asteroid to break through the atmosphere today, over a populated area, it would do so in a far more fragile geopolitical climate than back in 2013, with Russia’s war in Ukraine and an escalating US-China row over the perceived threat of flying objects.
“When these kinds of events are determined to be of natural causes, the flow of information is pretty good even in today’s environment,” says Mr Johnson. “But there certainly is concern in knowing quickly that it’s a natural event versus something that’s human caused.
“The entry and detonation of these objects by the heat pressure in the atmosphere, to the human eye, can look very much like an attack, whereas sophisticated instrumentation rapidly discerns the difference.”
Not a war zone, but the trail of Chelyabinsk’s meteor
‘A long way to go to find them all’
At the moment, there are some 31,000 asteroids being tracked – up from around 9,500 in 2013.
It’s a sign of how much more seriously the prospect of a dangerous impact has been taken since Chelyabinsk, which was the largest and best recorded asteroid impact on Earth since 1908. That was when an asteroid exploded over Siberia, flattening some 80 million trees in a blast equivalent to 15 million tons of dynamite.
Not being near a built-up area was again incredibly fortunate.
Russia’s sheer size is all that’s made it a relative hotbed of historic asteroid activity. With 70% of the Earth being covered by water, odds are that most asteroids – detected or not – end up in the ocean. An impact like Chelyabinsk is probably a once-in-a-century event, reckons NASA.
None of the 31,000 asteroids we know of are predicted to hit Earth in the next 100 years, says Prof Fitzsimmons, but there’s still “a long way to go to find them all”.
“But I’ll reassure you – I still come into work and pay into my pension plan.”
World
Body of missing rabbi Zvi Kogan found in UAE – as Israeli PM says he was murdered in ‘antisemitic terror incident’
The COP29 climate talks have reached a last ditch deal on cash for developing countries, pulling the summit back from the brink of collapse after a group of countries stormed out of a negotiating room earlier.
The slew of deals finally signed off in the small hours of Sunday morning in Azerbaijan includes one that proved hardest of all – one about money.
Eventually the more than 190 countries in Baku agreed a target for richer polluting countries such as the UK, EU and Japan to drum up $300bn a year by 2035 to help poorer nations both curb and adapt to climate change.
It is a far cry from the $1.3trn experts say is needed, and from the $500bn that vulnerable countries like Uganda had said they would be willing to accept.
But in the end they were forced to, knowing they could not afford to live without it, nor wait until next year to try again, when a Donald Trump presidency would make things even harder.
Bolivia’s lead negotiator Diego Pacheco called it an “insult”, while the Marshall Islands’ Tina Stege said it was “not nearly enough, but it’s a start”.
UN climate chief Simon Stiell said: “This new finance goal is an insurance policy for humanity, amid worsening climate impacts hitting every country.
“No country got everything they wanted, and we leave Baku with a mountain of work still to do. So this is no time for victory laps.”
The funding deal was clinched more than 24 hours into overtime, and against what felt like all the odds.
The talks were rocked from the start by the incoming presidency of climate denier Mr Trump, the moment Argentina’s team were recalled back to Buenos Aires by their right-wing president and a controversial letter that sent shockwaves through the United Nations.
Pic: AP
The fraught two weeks of negotiations pitted the anger of developing countries who are footing the bill for more dangerous weather that they did little to cause, against the tight public finances of rich countries.
A relieved Juan Carlos Monterrey Gomez, climate envoy for Panama, said there is “light at the end of the tunnel”.
Just hours ago, the talks almost fell apart as furious vulnerable nations stormed out of negotiations in frustration over that elusive funding goal.
They were also angry with oil and gas producing countries, who stood accused of trying to dilute aspects of the deal on cutting fossil fuels.
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Climate-vulnerable nations storm out of talks
The UN talks work on consensus, meaning everyone has to agree for a deal to fly.
A row over how to follow up on last year’s pledge to “transition away from fossil fuels” was left unresolved and punted into next year, following objections from Chile and Switzerland for being too weak.
A draft deal simply “reaffirmed” the commitment but did not dial up the pressure in the way the UK, EU, island states and many others here wanted.
Saudi Arabia fought the hardest against any step forward on cutting fossil fuels, the primary cause of climate change that is intensifying floods, drought and fires around the world.
Governments did manage to strike a deal on carbon markets at COP29, which has been 10 years in the making and will allow countries to trade emissions cuts.
‘Not everything we wanted’
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The UK’s energy secretary, Ed Miliband, said the deal is “not everything we or others wanted”, but described it as a “step forward”.
“It’s a deal that will drive forward the clean energy transition, which is essential for jobs and growth in Britain and for protecting us all against the worsening climate crisis,” he added.
“Today’s agreement sends the signal that the clean energy transition is unstoppable.
“It is the biggest economic opportunity of the 21st century and through our championing of it we can help crowd in private investment.”
Protesters at the summit in Baku. Pic: AP
Read more:
Azerbaijan president hails oil and gas as ‘gift from God’
UN climate summits ‘no longer fit for purpose’
The Azerbaijan team leading COP29 said: “Every hour of the day, we have pulled people together. Every inch of the way, we have pushed for the highest common denominator.
“We have faced geopolitical headwinds and made every effort to be an honest broker for all sides.”
At least 20 people have been killed and 66 injured in Israeli strikes on central Beirut, Lebanese authorities have said.
Lebanon‘s health ministry said the death toll could rise as emergency workers dig through the rubble looking for survivors. DNA tests are being used to identify the victims, the ministry added.
The attack destroyed an eight-storey residential building and badly damaged several others around it in the Basta neighbourhood at 4am (2am UK time) on Saturday.
The central Basta neighbourhood in Beirut
The Israeli military did not warn residents to evacuate before the attack and has not commented on the casualties.
At least four bombs were dropped in the attack – the fourth targeting the city centre this week.
A separate drone strike in the southern port city of Tyre this morning killed two people and injured three, according to the state-run National News Agency.
The victims were Palestinian refugees from the nearby al Rashidieh camp who were out fishing, according to Mohammed Bikai, spokesperson for the Fatah Palestinian faction in the Tyre area.
Israel’s military warned residents today in parts of Beirut’s southern suburbs that they were near Hezbollah facilities, which the army would target in the near future. The warning, posted on X, told people to evacuate at least 500 metres away.
The army said that over the past day it had conducted intelligence-based strikes on Hezbollah targets in Dahiyeh, in Beirut’s southern suburbs, where Hezbollah has a strong presence. It said it hit several command centres and weapons storage facilities.
Pic: AP
Israel has killed several Hezbollah leaders in air strikes on the capital’s southern suburbs.
Heavy fighting between Israel and Hezbollah is ongoing in southern Lebanon, as Israeli forces push deeper into the country since launching a major offensive in September.
According to the Lebanese health ministry, at least 3,670 people have been killed in Israeli attacks there, with more than 15,400 wounded.
It has displaced about 1.2 million people – a quarter of Lebanon’s population – while Israel says about 90 soldiers and nearly 50 civilians have been killed in northern Israel.
Read more:
No 10 indicates Netanyahu would be arrested
‘Dozens’ of Palestinians killed in Israeli airstrike
Meanwhile, six people, including three children and two women, were killed in the southern Gazan city of Khan Younis.
Some 44,176 Palestinians have been killed since the start of Israel’s military campaign in Gaza, according to the Gaza health ministry.
The ministry does not distinguish between civilians and combatants in its count, but it has said that more than half of the fatalities are women and children.
The war began when Hamas-led militants stormed into southern Israel on 7 October 2023, killing some 1,200 people and taking another 250 hostage.
US envoy Amos Hochstein was in the region this week to try to end more than 13 months of fighting between Israel and Hezbollah, ignited last October by the war in Gaza.
Mr Hochstein indicated progress had been made after meetings in Beirut on Tuesday and Wednesday, before going to meet Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and defence minister Israel Katz.
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