Meteorite hunters scour Ohio for fragments of 7-ton space rock that crashed into Earth

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MEDINA, Ohio (AP) — Meteorite hunters fanned out across a wide swath of Ohio on Thursday, hoping to collect fragments of an estimated 7-ton (6,350 kilograms) space rock that crashed into Earth this week after a dazzling fireball that was seen from hundreds of miles away.

The meteoroid broke apart around 9 a.m. Tuesday over Valley City, a half-hour south of Cleveland, after it sped through the atmosphere at about 45,000 miles (72,420 kilometers) per hour. It caused a sonic boom that rattled buildings and caused fears of an explosion. The fireball was seen from Wisconsin to Maryland, and NASA confirmed it was a meteoroid nearly 6 feet (1.8 meters) in diameter.

Medina resident December Harris didn’t have to go looking — her cousin and roommate, Ambra Sinclair, found a small black rock they suspect is a meteorite when she was leaving for work. They had heard the sonic boom Tuesday morning but figured it might have been noise from a nearby airport.

Harris said her roommate found the rock in a 4-foot (1.2-meter) area between the garage and the house late Wednesday morning. She described it as somewhat triangular shaped, less than 2 inches (5 centimeters) in diameter — and “very, very black,” with pits on the surface, grooves and a melted texture on its exterior.

Meteoroids are traveling at very high speeds when they suddenly hit gases that blanket Earth, causing tremendous stress as they compress the air in front of them. That heats the rock, which melts and breaks apart.

The sight of the black rock stuck out at Harris’ house.

“I’ve got a cleaned-off driveway,” said Harris, 70, a retired business owner. “There’s nothing like this around.”

She had heard she should avoid touching a meteorite with bare hands, so they picked it up with a napkin and placed it inside a jar. Now she’s looking for a way to authenticate it — no one answered the NASA phone number she called seven times.

“To us, me and my cousin, we have a strong faith in God,” Harris said. “We’re like, ‘God just dropped it out of heaven.’”

After he learned of the meteor sightings, meteorite collector and dealer Roberto Vargas hit the road to drive for hours from his home in Bristol, Connecticut, to Ohio.

He drove into the night and started his search shortly after sunrise Wednesday. It was nearly sundown though before he got lucky and came across a suspected meteorite. At noon on Thursday he located a second piece, which he said is “100% fusion crusted,” a museum-quality specimen he plans to keep.

It was enough to make the 40-year-old former mental health therapist wax poetic.

“It was a massive event — the shock waves, the sonic booms,” he said, taking a break from his search to do a phone interview. “This is a beauty of a fall.”

In nearly a decade of collecting, Vargas had found only about 20 meteorites in the wild. He’s among the hunters speculating that there might be a much larger piece out there — perhaps 20 pounds (9 kilograms) or more.

Vargas said there’s a mix of variables that will factor into how long he stays in the area.

“It depends on how many stones are found,” he said. “Do they continue to be found? And what the situation is like with huntable ground. There’s a lot of private property around here.”

Gabe Leidy thought maybe something had hit his house in North Ridgeville when he heard the boom, then went searching for pieces after work Wednesday afternoon.

The 39-year-old who works in supply chain management went to the Sharon Center area, where he thought a black space rock might stand out. That’s when he found “something that looks very, very, very much like a meteorite.”

Some people have already offered him hundreds or even thousands of dollars for it, but Leidy wants to hang on to it. For now it’s in a cupboard, but he imagines that one day it might end up in a museum.

“My goal here was just to find a memento that I can remember this probably once-in-a-lifetime event by,” he said.

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Scolforo reported from Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.