Michigan meteor: Here's everything we know

A fireball exploded in the sky Tuesday night over southeast Michigan. Here's what we've since learned: 

Yes, that was a meteor

Not long after the the National Weather Service confirmed the phenomenon wasn't weather-related, NASA confirmed that it was a meteor with a trajectory northwest of Detroit, from Brighton to Howell. 

People reported seeing the fireball from across Michigan, and even from other states, including Illinois, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, Missouri and Ontario, Canada. Multiple images were posted of night skies being lit up, as social media exploded with people reporting what they saw or heard.

A slow, dazzling meteor

NASA estimates a 2-yard-diameter meteor traveled at about 28,000 mph as it arrived -– which is considered very slow. For comparison, Leonid meteors that arrive each November are much smaller and move at 160,000 m.p.h., said Bill Cooke, lead for NASA's Meteoroid Environment Office in Huntsville, Ala.

"So this one was on the slow side, which is one reason why it made it so deep into the atmosphere," he said. 

Frequently, meteors can be observed in the night sky as shooting stars, burning farther up in the atmosphere. They tend to be about a millimeter in diameter and arrive at much higher speeds, attracting far less attention than Tuesday's event. 

"The faster you move, the more energy you dump in the atmosphere, which heats you up more and the less you survive," Cooke said. 

'Very rare' for Michigan

The meteor was a super bolide, meaning its brightness was between the full moon and the sun. Events such as this occur one to two times per month on this planet. 

"Not so rare for Earth," Cooke said. "Very rare for Michigan, because it's only a small area." 

It was a piece of an asteroid, and NASA is investigating where in space it came from. If meteorites are found on the ground, cosmic-ray exposure can be used to determine their age. 

Read more:

What to do if you find a piece of the Michigan meteor

NASA: Meteorites 'likely' on ground in southeast Michigan

It registered a 2.0 earthquake

The meteor caused a 2.0 magnitude earthquake, the United States Geological Survey reported on its website. People reported their windows and houses shaking as the meteor arrived. 

What was the boom?

Meteorites break up in our atmosphere because they’re essentially being crushed as they roar through the relatively dense air at tens of thousands of miles per hour.

But the boom southeastern Michigan residents heard from the meteorite Tuesday night wasn’t from it exploding; it was a sonic boom from it traveling more than 40 times the speed of sound. Like a fast-moving boat creating a wake through water, meteorites, jets or other objects moving faster than the speed of sound (about 700 mph in the atmosphere) create a “sound wake” that is often heard as a loud boom.

“It’s just this explosion through the air as it's moving, because of the big shock wave," said Michael Liemohn, a professor in the University of Michigan’s Department of Climate and Space Sciences and Engineering.

Meteorites are probably on the ground

The meteor broke up about 20 miles over the Earth, causing a shower of space rocks perhaps 1-2 ounces in size.

"Material falling was picked up by a Doppler weather radar," Cooke said, adding that meteorites could be spread over 2½ miles in Livingston County's Hamburg Township. A map compiled by NASA shows most of the debris came down along M-36.

If they land on your property, they're yours to keep. Meteorites are safe to touch, radioactivity isn't a big concern, and they cool off on their way down. 

"You can pick up a meteorite right after it lands," Cooke said. "Meteorites are not smoking hunks of rock." 

They may look like Earth's rocks, but with signs of burning. If you think you've found one, you can use this self-test checklist and perhaps submit it for testing at one of these locations. 

What if you find it on state land?

The general area where the largest pieces fell encompasses plenty of state land, including the state-run Brighton Recreation Area.

So, if you find a meteorite on state land, can you keep it?

It depends on how big it is and what you plan to do with it, said Michigan Department of Natural Resources spokesman Ed Golder.

“Although there is no public land regulation that applies directly to meteorites, another rule applicable to state-managed public land would apply in this case,” he said. “That rule prohibits the removal ‘from state-owned land more than the aggregate total weight of 25 pounds, per individual per year, of any rock, mineral specimen (exclusive of any gold bearing material), or invertebrate fossil for individual or non-commercial hobby use.’”

With a 1-pound meteorite potentially worth up to $1 million, there’s more bad news if you found it on state land. The State of Michigan prohibits commercialization of materials taken from public land without a permit to do so, Golder said. “So it would be illegal to sell anything taken from state-managed public land,” he said.

“Finally, we would hope that citizens would alert us to any item on public land that is of cultural or scientific significance, so those items can be shared with the broader public,” Golder said.

Does my homeowner's insurance cover meteors?

So a meteorite comes crashing through the roof of your home or business. Are you covered?

Yes, says the the Insurance Alliance of Michigan,
 
The trade groups says falling objects, including satellites, asteroids, meteors and space debris, are covered under standard homeowners and business insurance policies. There is coverage for the damage the falling object causes to the structure of the home or business, as well as to property or belongings damaged within the building, the group said in a news release.

Not Michigan's first report in past year

According to hundreds of eyewitness reports and as evidenced by surveillance cams, a massive, blue-green fireball shot through the Midwestern night sky Feb. 5, 2017, and was projected to have landed in northern Lake Michigan.

The American Meteor Society at the time received more than 200 reports from witnesses in Wisconsin, Illinois, Michigan, Indiana, Minnesota, Iowa, Ohio and even New York. 

Was it prophesied?

A Downriver minister did predict it just a couple of weeks ago.

"I had a dream that a meteor was coming to the Great Lakes and it was gonna hit Michigan," pastor Rick Satterfield, 59, with I Am Church, said in a video dated Dec. 31, 2017. "It would cause Ohio and Canada to feel the impact of it."

Contact Robert Allen on Twitter @rallenMI or rallen@freepress.com. Free Press staff writers Keith Matheny and Hasan Dudar and the Associated Press contributed to this report.