Videos: Space Rock Explodes Over Russia, Slams Into Building
The same day that an asteroid half the size of a football field will narrowly miss Earth, a different space rock exploded over three cities in western Russia. The fireball went down during the region's morning commute today, sending drivers scrambling to upload their in-dash videos to the web.
Fireballs bursting over the Earth is nothing unusual. What is rare is to catch them on camera -- from perhaps hundreds of vantage points.
Here's why there are so many videos of the Russian meteorite. Crooks in that country will do anything for a ruble, including throw themselves into a moving car to extort money from drivers. Russian traffic laws make it practically impossible for drivers to defend themselves in court without video evidence, however, which is why most Russian drivers today have wide-angle video cameras on the dash.
So, when this morning's meteorite exploded 12 miles above the ground, users flooded Twitter and YouTube with footage of the astronomical event. (See below.)