{"id":668245,"date":"2026-03-20T03:16:13","date_gmt":"2026-03-20T03:16:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/668245\/"},"modified":"2026-03-20T03:16:13","modified_gmt":"2026-03-20T03:16:13","slug":"meteorite-hunters-search-ohio-for-pieces-of-7-ton-space-rock","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/668245\/","title":{"rendered":"Meteorite hunters search Ohio for pieces of 7-ton space rock"},"content":{"rendered":"

MEDINA, Ohio (AP) \u2014 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<\/a> that crashed into Earth this week after a dazzling fireball that was seen from hundreds of miles away.<\/p>\n

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.<\/p>\n

Medina resident December Harris didn\u2019t have to go looking \u2014 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.<\/p>\n

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 \u2014 and \u201cvery, very black,\u201d with pits on the surface, grooves and a melted texture on its exterior.<\/p>\n

Meteoroids<\/a> 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.<\/p>\n

The sight of the black rock stuck out at Harris\u2019 house.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve got a cleaned-off driveway,\u201d said Harris, 70, a retired business owner. \u201cThere\u2019s nothing like this around.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\u2019s looking for a way to authenticate it \u2014 no one answered the NASA phone number she called seven times.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo us, me and my cousin, we have a strong faith in God,\u201d Harris said. \u201cWe\u2019re like, \u2018God just dropped it out of heaven.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

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.<\/p>\n

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 \u201c100% fusion crusted,\u201d a museum-quality specimen he plans to keep.<\/p>\n

It was enough to make the 40-year-old former mental health therapist wax poetic.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was a massive event \u2014 the shock waves, the sonic booms,\u201d he said, taking a break from his search to do a phone interview. \u201cThis is a beauty of a fall.\u201d<\/p>\n

In nearly a decade of collecting, Vargas had found only about 20 meteorites in the wild. He\u2019s among the hunters speculating that there might be a much larger piece out there \u2014 perhaps 20 pounds (9 kilograms) or more.<\/p>\n

Vargas said there\u2019s a mix of variables that will factor into how long he stays in the area.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt depends on how many stones are found,\u201d he said. \u201cDo they continue to be found? And what the situation is like with huntable ground. There\u2019s a lot of private property around here.\u201d<\/p>\n

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.<\/p>\n

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\u2019s when he found \u201csomething that looks very, very, very much like a meteorite.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\u2019s in a cupboard, but he imagines that one day it might end up in a museum.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy goal here was just to find a memento that I can remember this probably once-in-a-lifetime event by,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

Scolforo reported from Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"MEDINA, Ohio (AP) \u2014 Meteorite hunters fanned out across a wide swath of Ohio on Thursday, hoping to…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":668246,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[24],"tags":[9603,4514,2738,15582,282360,57,282361,27903,1571,165,1574,1573,27902,282151,159,783,61,67,132,68],"class_list":["post-668245","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-space","tag-asteroids","tag-astronomy","tag-connecticut","tag-explosions","tag-gabe-leidy","tag-general-news","tag-medina","tag-meteors-and-meteorites","tag-national","tag-national-aeronautics-and-space-administration","tag-oh-state-wire","tag-ohio","tag-planets","tag-roberto-vargas","tag-science","tag-space","tag-u-s-news","tag-united-states","tag-unitedstates","tag-us"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116259336400153714","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/668245","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=668245"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/668245\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/668246"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=668245"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=668245"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=668245"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}