Relative strength of Megatons of TNT outputs

Perhaps it is stating the overly obvious, but not all space related phenomena need be observed at night. This past October 8 observers imaged a high altitude fireball explosion over Indonesia sometime before mid day. The event had an estimated kinetic output of roughly 40,000 tons of TNT. That is roughly triple the energetic discharge of the Little Boy nuclear weapon deployed by the United States over Hiroshima, Japan.

There was no impact or catastrophic fallout from this Indonesian incident but there have been other similar events that have led to significant altering of the Earth’s environment. The most powerful recent occurrence was the Tunguska Event which occurred 3-6 miles over Siberia in 1908. The energy output of this event is estimated at 10-15 megatons of TNT or roughly 1/3 the power of the most powerful man made nuclear explosion, the 50 megaton Russian hydrogen bomb Tsar Bomba. To keep things in perspective, and our egos in check, when a star goes supernova it releases something like 10 octillion or 10²⁸ megatons of TNT. These are nuclear energies we can barely comprehend, let alone engineer.

The first recorded professional expedition to the Tunguska site did not arrive until more than 10 years later due to its remote location and the war torn nature of Russia at the time. The witnesses observed no impact crater and 30 miles of scorched trees knocked down from a central location. Hypotheses for this event range from the feasible large meteoric air burst to a traveling black hole to a crash landed alien UFO. As there are no reliable eye-witness accounts we must rely on the most plausible scientific inference of a meteoric air burst event over which we have no control. These types of powerful atmospheric events occur all too frequently as we go about our insulated and self important lives. Observations like these serve to remind those of us that might marvel at humanity’s mastery over nature and other men that we are far more passive in relation to the greater cosmic energy pathways.