# Asteroid burns up in Cleveland, OH area (3/16/2026) **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [March 17, 2026, 11:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asteroid-burns-up-in-cleveland-oh-area-3-16-2026/1028531 "2026-03-17T23:11:37Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2026, 8:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asteroid-burns-up-in-cleveland-oh-area-3-16-2026/1028531/21 "2026-03-18T20:14:46Z")
In the meantime, I saw on Reddit that the Omaha area had a similar experience earlier today, although it doesn’t look like anybody saw anything. ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2026, 8:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asteroid-burns-up-in-cleveland-oh-area-3-16-2026/1028531/22 "2026-03-18T20:26:01Z")
This looks like a good candidate. > **[Potential Meteorite?](https://www.reddit.com/r/meteorites/comments/1rx9nu7/potential_meteorite/)** > > 104 points | 38 comments — u/Opposite-Permission4 ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2026, 11:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asteroid-burns-up-in-cleveland-oh-area-3-16-2026/1028531/23 "2026-03-18T23:16:04Z")
Here’s a bigger piece found by meteorite collector [Roberto Vargas.](https://www.inverse.com/science/meteorite-hunters) Confirms that the fuzzier Reddit photos (from a random civilian) are what I suspected it to be, not only a meteorite but a rare type: an achondrite, maybe a Eucrite. [![](https://i.ibb.co/R47vb8FQ/FB-IMG-1773875214252.jpg) ](https://i.ibb.co/R47vb8FQ/FB-IMG-1773875214252.jpg) (By weird coincidence, the recent one in Germany was also an achondrote, likely a Eucrite.) (The HED group of meteorite types, for Howardrites, Eucrites, and Diogenites, are from the asteroid [Vesta](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/4_Vesta).) ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2026, 1:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asteroid-burns-up-in-cleveland-oh-area-3-16-2026/1028531/24 "2026-03-19T01:10:41Z")
> [@Darren\_Garrison](#): > > (By weird coincidence, the recent one in Germany was also an achondrote, likely a Eucrite.) Is that a coincidence, or does their similarity and commonality in time suggest they’re part of the same swarm and perhaps the same formation event umpteen million years ago? I know I don’t know, but good bet you’ve got more topic-relevant knowledge than I do. ---
**Author:** ![SuntanLotion](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/suntanlotion/32/16165_2.png) [@SuntanLotion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SuntanLotion)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2026, 1:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asteroid-burns-up-in-cleveland-oh-area-3-16-2026/1028531/25 "2026-03-19T01:19:52Z")
March in Ohio. Bigfoot, 75 degrees, meteor, Afroman. Whats next? ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2026, 1:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asteroid-burns-up-in-cleveland-oh-area-3-16-2026/1028531/26 "2026-03-19T01:29:35Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > Is that a coincidence, or does their similarity and commonality in time suggest they’re part of the same swarm and perhaps the same formation event umpteen million years ago? In the 10 days between falls, Earth has moved around 10 degrees and 16 million miles further around it’s orbit, so it would have had to be a pretty wide swarm. Having said that, they likely DID ultimately come from the same impact event, but as you said, they have been orbiting the sun for umpteen million years, so it is still a pretty big coincidence that two hit the Earth less than two weeks apart. > **[HED meteorite](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HED_meteorite)** > > HED meteorites are a clan (subgroup) of achondrite meteorites. HED stands for "howardite–eucrite–diogenite". > These achondrites came from a differentiated parent body and experienced extensive igneous processing not much different from the magmatic rocks found on Earth and for this reason they closely resemble terrestrial igneous rocks. > HED meteorites are broadly divided into: > Several subgroups of both eucrites and diogenites have been found. > The HED meteorites account for about 5% of all falls... > It is thought that the method of transport from Vesta to Earth is as follows:[8] > > An impact on Vesta ejected debris, creating small (10 kilometres (6.2 mi) diameter or less) V-type asteroids. Either the asteroidal chunks were ejected as such, or were formed from smaller debris. Some of these small asteroids formed the Vesta family, while others were scattered somewhat further.[9] This event is thought to have happened less than 1 billion years ago.[10] There is an enormous impact crater on Vesta covering much of the southern hemisphere which is the best candidate for the site of this impact. The amount of rock that was excavated there is many times more than enough to account for all known V-type asteroids. > Some of the more far-flung asteroid debris ended up in the 3:1 Kirkwood gap. This is an unstable region due to strong perturbations by Jupiter, and asteroids that end up here get ejected into very different orbits on a timescale of about 100 million years. Some of these bodies are perturbed into near-Earth orbits forming the small V-type near-Earth asteroids such as e.g. 3551 Verenia, 3908 Nyx, or 4055 Magellan. > Later, smaller impacts on these near-Earth objects dislodged rock-sized meteorites, some of which later struck Earth. On the basis of cosmic ray exposure measurements, it is thought that most HED meteorites arose from several distinct impact events of this kind, and spent from about 6 million to 73 million years in space before striking the Earth.[11] ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2026, 1:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asteroid-burns-up-in-cleveland-oh-area-3-16-2026/1028531/27 "2026-03-19T01:37:37Z")
Thank you. Far more learning than I was expecting, but I’m eager for all of it. ---
**Author:** ![Peter\_Morris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peter_morris/32/359_2.png) [@Peter\_Morris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peter_Morris)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2026, 8:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asteroid-burns-up-in-cleveland-oh-area-3-16-2026/1028531/28 "2026-03-19T08:21:50Z")
Was it really an “asteroid”, though? Isn’t it a “meteor”? ---
**Author:** ![eburacum45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eburacum45/32/8690_2.png) [@eburacum45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eburacum45)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2026, 9:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asteroid-burns-up-in-cleveland-oh-area-3-16-2026/1028531/29 "2026-03-19T09:07:25Z")
There doesn’t seem to be a hard definition for an asteroid. However, Wikipedia says that the next smallest class of orbiting object, a _meteoroid_, is up to a metre in diameter. Since this object was about twice as large as that, it was too large to be called a meteoroid (by the wiki definition, if we can trust that) so could be called an asteroid. When it hit the Earth’s atmosphere it became a _meteor_, a bright one that would probably be classed as a _bolide_ or a _fireball_; any fragments that hit the ground are _meteorites_, which is a kind of rock. As this is the Straight Dope I’d be interested if Darren Garrison (or anyone else) has a more specific definition and lower limit for asteroid size. ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2026, 1:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asteroid-burns-up-in-cleveland-oh-area-3-16-2026/1028531/30 "2026-03-19T13:29:34Z")
> [@Peter\_Morris](#): > > Was it really an “asteroid”, though? Isn’t it a “meteor”? Yes, it was really an asteroid. An asteroid is a chunk of rock orbiting the sun. A meteor is the bright trail created by an asteroid intersecting the Earth’s atmosphere. A meteorite is an asteroid that reached the ground. (A comet is a _wet_ rock orbiting the sun. A piece of one produces a meteor, but not usually meteorites.) ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2026, 1:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asteroid-burns-up-in-cleveland-oh-area-3-16-2026/1028531/31 "2026-03-19T13:37:51Z")
> [@eburacum45](#): > > has a more specific definition and lower limit for asteroid size. I mean, it is all nitpicking. You can call pieces of a mountain that broke off a boulder, a cobble, or a pebble depending on size, but they are all pieces of the mountain. Whether the rock in space is one centimeter, one meter, or 100 meters, it still came off an asteroid. ---
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2026, 3:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asteroid-burns-up-in-cleveland-oh-area-3-16-2026/1028531/32 "2026-03-19T15:14:12Z")
God is throwing rocks at Cleveland. Therefore, God hates Cleveland. So say we all. ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2026, 6:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asteroid-burns-up-in-cleveland-oh-area-3-16-2026/1028531/33 "2026-03-19T18:00:54Z")
Some incredible pieces are being found. This one was found by another random civilian. Highly oriented and looks similar to an [Australian button tektite](https://onlineonly.christies.com/s/sculpted-nature-fossils-minerals-meteorites/button-tektite-39/117704). [![](https://i.ibb.co/5hwRSY7F/FB-IMG-1773942591958.jpg) ](https://i.ibb.co/5hwRSY7F/FB-IMG-1773942591958.jpg) [![](https://i.ibb.co/Gfts4HRW/FB-IMG-1773926566679.jpg) ](https://i.ibb.co/Gfts4HRW/FB-IMG-1773926566679.jpg) Here’s another found by Roberta Vargas. [![](https://i.ibb.co/bRNwjrCG/FB-IMG-1773942501897.jpg) ](https://i.ibb.co/bRNwjrCG/FB-IMG-1773942501897.jpg) Both of these, because of their appearance, not their type, are worth thousands. Top of the top world-class quality, and museum-grade. ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2026, 1:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asteroid-burns-up-in-cleveland-oh-area-3-16-2026/1028531/34 "2026-03-21T01:45:18Z")
> [@Darren\_Garrison](#): > > Some incredible pieces are being found. This one was found by another random civilian. Highly oriented and looks similar to an [Australian button tektite](https://onlineonly.christies.com/s/sculpted-nature-fossils-minerals-meteorites/button-tektite-39/117704). Here’s a nice interview with the guy who found this one. > **['It’s got some weight to it': Man makes exciting find in meteor fragment zone](https://www.news5cleveland.com/news/local-news/its-got-some-weight-to-it-man-makes-exciting-find-in-meteor-fragment-zone)** > > A man found what appears to be a meteorite from that seven-ton asteroid that zoomed across Northeast Ohio at 40-thousand miles-per-hour Tuesday morning, says NASA, before fragmenting over Medina County. ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2026, 3:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asteroid-burns-up-in-cleveland-oh-area-3-16-2026/1028531/35 "2026-03-21T03:10:59Z")
That “COVID virus” rock is quite cool, although it probably wasn’t when it landed. ISTR that when this happened in Pennsylvania in 1992, a chunk of it damaged a young woman’s car so badly that it had to be totaled, but even if her insurance company hadn’t reimbursed her, a museum paid enough for the meteorite, and the car too, to more than cover the expenses. > **[Spectacular Meteor Caught on Video during Football Game](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5S3WfNDD59Y%2F)** > > Although there is no sound, it's still remarkable nonetheless. ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2026, 3:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asteroid-burns-up-in-cleveland-oh-area-3-16-2026/1028531/36 "2026-03-21T03:26:55Z")
> **[The Peekskill Meteorite Car Official Website](https://meteoritecar.com/)** > > The official website of the Peekskill Meteorite Car, the most famous object to ever be struck by a meteorite. (BTW, meteorites that strike a human-built artifact is called a hammer stone.) ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2026, 2:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asteroid-burns-up-in-cleveland-oh-area-3-16-2026/1028531/37 "2026-03-22T02:32:34Z")
Speaking of hammer stones, the most recent meteorite to fall through a house was in Texas seven hours ago. > **[FOX 4 News](https://www.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=1391284133047645&id=100064982130157&mibextid=xfxF2i&rdid=KIyZY9utwHsMCgPY&share_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.facebook.com%2Fshare%2Fp%2F18UgNZ4urQ%2F%3Fmibextid%3DxfxF2i)** > > After reports came in of a suspected meteorite exploding over Texas, a woman near Houston says a potential piece of the answer may have been what crashed through her roof. READ MORE BELOW > (CREDIT:... ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2026, 2:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asteroid-burns-up-in-cleveland-oh-area-3-16-2026/1028531/38 "2026-03-22T02:55:03Z")
We have another one?!?!? ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2026, 2:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asteroid-burns-up-in-cleveland-oh-area-3-16-2026/1028531/39 "2026-03-22T02:56:13Z")
Yes, this afternoon. ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2026, 4:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asteroid-burns-up-in-cleveland-oh-area-3-16-2026/1028531/40 "2026-03-22T04:14:07Z")
Shockingly good news video of the meteorite. (Usually news reports are 55 seconds of people talking and 5 seconds of the meteorite seen from a distance.) > **[A meteoroid hit a Houston home. Yes, you read that correctly! If you heard...](https://www.facebook.com/reel/1917535479131729?mibextid=D5vuiz&rdid=v5dnta8xPCvLqxfM&share_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.facebook.com%2Fshare%2Fr%2F1C749SX5zZ%2F%3Fmibextid%3DD5vuiz)** > > A meteoroid hit a Houston home. Yes, you read that correctly! > > If you heard a big “boom” or thought you saw a shooting star around 3-4pm, today, that quick flash in the sky wasn’t small at all—it... [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asteroid-burns-up-in-cleveland-oh-area-3-16-2026/1028531.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/asteroid-burns-up-in-cleveland-oh-area-3-16-2026/1028531.md?page=3)