10 ms·

The Tunguska Mystery 100 Years Later (2008)

94 points by olivermarks 4y ago

bastawhiz 4y ago
Was there a follow-up? This was written fifteen years ago.
- loloquwowndueo 4y ago
  “115 years later” doesn’t have as nice a ring to it :)
mikequinlan 4y ago
June 30, 2008
_qua 4y ago
Seems that there were follow up studies after this one in 2008 which raise doubts about the conclusion that the lake was formed by an impactor. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tunguska_event https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tunguska_event
- echelon 4y ago
  The article on the lake itself [1] seems to paint a different picture - contradictory evidence and a lack of certainty. While the recent 2017 study cites core samples, earlier studies suggested that sediments were not a part of the lake formation. I don't think there's enough detail in the Wikipedia articles to really shed light on this. Every study seems to reach different conclusions. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Cheko https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Cheko --- Edit: You nerd-sniped me. Here's a meteor that produced an earth-grazing fireball over Utah and exited back into space: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1972_Great_Daylight_Fireball https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1972_Great_Daylight_Fireball I gotta get back to work...
  - mock-possum 4y ago
    Seems very romantic. That fireball is still out there somewhere. We might never see it again.
    - IntrepidWorm 4y ago
      The ball is. At least it was considerate enough to leave it's fire behind.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
virgulino 4y ago
"First expedition to depths of Lake Cheko close to epicentre of Tunguska event to start in February", Siberian Times, February 2022 https://siberiantimes.com/other/others/news/first-expedition-to-depths-of-lake-cheko-close-to-the-epicentre-of-tunguska-event-to-start-in-february/ https://siberiantimes.com/other/others/news/first-expedition...
JoeAltmaier 4y ago
Have to mention the Tesla/Robert Peary conspiracy theory. The date Tunguska happened Tesla had asked Robert Peary to observe any unusual weather phenomena. None were reported. Tesla had reputedly activated his energy transmitter at Wardencliff, focused on Peary's location. If you draw that line (Wardencliff to Peary's expedition location) and double it, you have the Tunguska forest.
- Izkata 4y ago
  Hm.. > In 1946, for instance, science-fiction writer Alexander Kazantsev explained the puzzling scene by positing a scenario in which an alien spacecraft had exploded in the atmosphere. Maybe Tesla shot down a UFO, and it self-destructed to prevent their technology from falling into our hands.
  - thriftwy 4y ago
    Or, as in Strugatsky brothers plot, the aliens were moving back in time so they continued living on in the age XIX, and perhaps left after repairs.
  - JKCalhoun 4y ago
    Known to the Beta-Centaurians as The Earth Event. It essentially scuttled all further exploration of our solar system.
- bdhcuidbebe 4y ago
  since its now written down, its basically established facts. /s
  - dopidopHN 4y ago
    Tomorrow in your friendly neiboorhoud LLM outputs !
- wheelerof4te 4y ago
  There's no doubt that Nikola Tesla possesed some, let's not say a weapon, but knowledge about a very advanced way to cause mass destruction for it's time. In a way, his mind was that weapon. And it's a good thing, too. Imagine someone else with that kind of knowledge.
andrewl 4y ago
A similar event in or near a populated area today might be interpreted as a nuclear attack.
- remote_phone 4y ago
  The entire world would have detected the meteor that large and been warned
  - andrewl 4y ago
    The Wikipedia page for the Tunguska event says it was “a stony asteroid about 50–60 metres (160–200 feet) in size.” How far out would something that size be detected? This is very much out of my area.
    - kzrdude 4y ago
      The other mentioned much smaller one has a whole article on it https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2023_CX1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2023_CX1 This one was 1 m wide and it seems like it was detected about 6 hours before coming down.
      - ale42 4y ago
        But, as someone mentioned in another comment, the fact that we can detect a 1 m objects doesn't mean that we can detect all of them, far from that. Same for larger ones, we just have more chances of detecting those than 1 m-sized ones.
  - adastra22 4y ago
    No, we routinely get hit by rocks we didn’t see coming.
  - JoeDaDude 4y ago
    Detecting incoming asteroids, especially small ones, is really hard. The recent 1-meter meteor that exploded over Europe, was only the seventh instance of a successful detection. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/2023/02/13/asteroid-explodes-english-channel-rare-early-detection/ https://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/2023/02/13/asteroid-expl...
AlbertCory 4y ago
> We sought evidence that the little lake existed before the event. Reliable, pre-1908 maps of this uninhabited region of Siberia are not easy to come by, but we found a czarist military map from 1883 that fails to show the lake. Testimony by local Evenk natives also asserts that a lake was produced by the 1908 explosion. this is about as suggestive a set of facts as you're ever likely to get. We don't need any exotic theories about Tesla or aliens. > The first step in preparing ourselves would be to decide whether the cosmic object that affected Siberia was an asteroid or a comet. What would we do differently if we determined conclusively which it was? A comet could strike Earth, even if Tunguska was not one. Knowing that it happened doesn't make it any more likely it could happen again.
- faceloss 4y ago
  [dead]
- sandworm101 4y ago
  One is more common that the other. And size matters. The smaller this object was, the more likely it will be to happen again. So it's exact size and composition matters when calculating future likelihoods.
  - AlbertCory 4y ago
    well, it caused a city-killing explosion. What would we do differently if the projected size estimates varied by 10x? It's scientifically interesting. Nothing wrong with that.
    - sandworm101 4y ago
      It might make the difference between ignoring a potential city-killer impact, and an all-or-nothing attempt to save us from civilization-ending event. To make such decisions we need to know what a particular type of incoming object might do. That means careful study of the few examples we already have in our history.
recuter 4y ago
I'll just leave this here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonid_Kulik https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonid_Kulik http://scihi.org/leonid-kulik-tunguska-event/ http://scihi.org/leonid-kulik-tunguska-event/ I_am_not_saying_it_was_aliens.gif
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
toss1 4y ago
Related: Sandia Labs did some impressive simulations of that event entering the atmosphere. A couple of the resulting videos; well worth a minute to watch. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0yY34uWty_0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0yY34uWty_0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gr7i33UhmC8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gr7i33UhmC8
dang 4y ago
Related. Others? A Tunguska size burst destroyed Tall el-Hammam, Bronze Age city in Jordan Valley - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28603118 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28603118 - Sept 2021 (344 comments) The Tunguska Event - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12061852 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12061852 - July 2016 (119 comments) The Tunguska Event - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11155701 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11155701 - Feb 2016 (71 comments) Tunguska Event - a blast from the past [ Meteroite hit on Siberia 1908] - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5229807 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5229807 - Feb 2013 (4 comments) The Tunguska Event - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2314154 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2314154 - March 2011 (1 comment) The Siberian Blast (or the Tunguska event) Visualized in a Supercomputer - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=257373 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=257373 - July 2008 (1 comment)

94 points by olivermarks 4y ago

bastawhiz 4y ago

Was there a follow-up? This was written fifteen years ago.

loloquwowndueo 4y ago
“115 years later” doesn’t have as nice a ring to it :)

mikequinlan 4y ago

June 30, 2008

_qua 4y ago

Seems that there were follow up studies after this one in 2008 which raise doubts about the conclusion that the lake was formed by an impactor. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tunguska_event https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tunguska_event

echelon 4y ago
The article on the lake itself [1] seems to paint a different picture - contradictory evidence and a lack of certainty. While the recent 2017 study cites core samples, earlier studies suggested that sediments were not a part of the lake formation. I don't think there's enough detail in the Wikipedia articles to really shed light on this. Every study seems to reach different conclusions. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Cheko https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Cheko --- Edit: You nerd-sniped me. Here's a meteor that produced an earth-grazing fireball over Utah and exited back into space: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1972_Great_Daylight_Fireball https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1972_Great_Daylight_Fireball I gotta get back to work...
- mock-possum 4y ago
  Seems very romantic. That fireball is still out there somewhere. We might never see it again.
  - IntrepidWorm 4y ago
    The ball is. At least it was considerate enough to leave it's fire behind.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

virgulino 4y ago

"First expedition to depths of Lake Cheko close to epicentre of Tunguska event to start in February", Siberian Times, February 2022 https://siberiantimes.com/other/others/news/first-expedition-to-depths-of-lake-cheko-close-to-the-epicentre-of-tunguska-event-to-start-in-february/ https://siberiantimes.com/other/others/news/first-expedition...

JoeAltmaier 4y ago

Have to mention the Tesla/Robert Peary conspiracy theory. The date Tunguska happened Tesla had asked Robert Peary to observe any unusual weather phenomena. None were reported. Tesla had reputedly activated his energy transmitter at Wardencliff, focused on Peary's location. If you draw that line (Wardencliff to Peary's expedition location) and double it, you have the Tunguska forest.

Izkata 4y ago
Hm.. > In 1946, for instance, science-fiction writer Alexander Kazantsev explained the puzzling scene by positing a scenario in which an alien spacecraft had exploded in the atmosphere. Maybe Tesla shot down a UFO, and it self-destructed to prevent their technology from falling into our hands.
- thriftwy 4y ago
  Or, as in Strugatsky brothers plot, the aliens were moving back in time so they continued living on in the age XIX, and perhaps left after repairs.
- JKCalhoun 4y ago
  Known to the Beta-Centaurians as The Earth Event. It essentially scuttled all further exploration of our solar system.
bdhcuidbebe 4y ago
since its now written down, its basically established facts. /s
- dopidopHN 4y ago
  Tomorrow in your friendly neiboorhoud LLM outputs !
wheelerof4te 4y ago
There's no doubt that Nikola Tesla possesed some, let's not say a weapon, but knowledge about a very advanced way to cause mass destruction for it's time. In a way, his mind was that weapon. And it's a good thing, too. Imagine someone else with that kind of knowledge.

andrewl 4y ago

A similar event in or near a populated area today might be interpreted as a nuclear attack.

remote_phone 4y ago
The entire world would have detected the meteor that large and been warned
- andrewl 4y ago
  The Wikipedia page for the Tunguska event says it was “a stony asteroid about 50–60 metres (160–200 feet) in size.” How far out would something that size be detected? This is very much out of my area.
  - kzrdude 4y ago
    The other mentioned much smaller one has a whole article on it https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2023_CX1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2023_CX1 This one was 1 m wide and it seems like it was detected about 6 hours before coming down.
    - ale42 4y ago
      But, as someone mentioned in another comment, the fact that we can detect a 1 m objects doesn't mean that we can detect all of them, far from that. Same for larger ones, we just have more chances of detecting those than 1 m-sized ones.
- adastra22 4y ago
  No, we routinely get hit by rocks we didn’t see coming.
- JoeDaDude 4y ago
  Detecting incoming asteroids, especially small ones, is really hard. The recent 1-meter meteor that exploded over Europe, was only the seventh instance of a successful detection. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/2023/02/13/asteroid-explodes-english-channel-rare-early-detection/ https://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/2023/02/13/asteroid-expl...

AlbertCory 4y ago

> We sought evidence that the little lake existed before the event. Reliable, pre-1908 maps of this uninhabited region of Siberia are not easy to come by, but we found a czarist military map from 1883 that fails to show the lake. Testimony by local Evenk natives also asserts that a lake was produced by the 1908 explosion. this is about as suggestive a set of facts as you're ever likely to get. We don't need any exotic theories about Tesla or aliens. > The first step in preparing ourselves would be to decide whether the cosmic object that affected Siberia was an asteroid or a comet. What would we do differently if we determined conclusively which it was? A comet could strike Earth, even if Tunguska was not one. Knowing that it happened doesn't make it any more likely it could happen again.

faceloss 4y ago
[dead]
sandworm101 4y ago
One is more common that the other. And size matters. The smaller this object was, the more likely it will be to happen again. So it's exact size and composition matters when calculating future likelihoods.
- AlbertCory 4y ago
  well, it caused a city-killing explosion. What would we do differently if the projected size estimates varied by 10x? It's scientifically interesting. Nothing wrong with that.
  - sandworm101 4y ago
    It might make the difference between ignoring a potential city-killer impact, and an all-or-nothing attempt to save us from civilization-ending event. To make such decisions we need to know what a particular type of incoming object might do. That means careful study of the few examples we already have in our history.

recuter 4y ago

I'll just leave this here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonid_Kulik https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonid_Kulik http://scihi.org/leonid-kulik-tunguska-event/ http://scihi.org/leonid-kulik-tunguska-event/ I_am_not_saying_it_was_aliens.gif

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

toss1 4y ago

Related: Sandia Labs did some impressive simulations of that event entering the atmosphere. A couple of the resulting videos; well worth a minute to watch. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0yY34uWty_0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0yY34uWty_0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gr7i33UhmC8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gr7i33UhmC8

dang 4y ago

Related. Others? A Tunguska size burst destroyed Tall el-Hammam, Bronze Age city in Jordan Valley - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28603118 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28603118 - Sept 2021 (344 comments) The Tunguska Event - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12061852 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12061852 - July 2016 (119 comments) The Tunguska Event - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11155701 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11155701 - Feb 2016 (71 comments) Tunguska Event - a blast from the past [ Meteroite hit on Siberia 1908] - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5229807 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5229807 - Feb 2013 (4 comments) The Tunguska Event - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2314154 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2314154 - March 2011 (1 comment) The Siberian Blast (or the Tunguska event) Visualized in a Supercomputer - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=257373 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=257373 - July 2008 (1 comment)