Shortly after local sunrise on February 15th of 2013, a meteor as big as a building reached Earth’s atmosphere and produced a massive explosion above Chelyabinsk, a densely populated Russian metropolis. The highly sensitive OMPS instrument on board NPP observed the plume from the explosion 1,100km eastward. Scientists used the data from this first observation and ran two NASA models to project the path of the plume. The results show that the plume’s higher layer would move ahead of the lower layer due to the difference in wind velocity at higher and lower altitudes. The models also showed that the plume would circumnavigate the entire globe and return to Chelyabinsk by February 19th, 2013. As more OMPS observations came in, it was clear that they coincided with the projected path perfectly. The results from this study proved the accuracy of the models as well as the unprecedented sensitivity of the OMPS instrument. The OMPS instrument was able to detect remains of the plume months after the initial explosion, which helped scientists track and study the plume for a long period of time. Since the Earth is constantly impacted by meteoric debris, an instrument like OMPS gives the scientists hope that in its 5-year design lifetime, they will better understand the effect of meteors and particles on the stratosphere, as well as the chemistry of our stratosphere and atmospheric ozone layer.", "items": [], "extra_data": {} }, { "id": 345328, "url": "https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/11336/#media_group_345328", "widget": "Video player", "title": "", "caption": "", "description": "A meteor weighing 10,000 metric tons exploded only 23km above the city of Chelyabinsk in Russia on Feruary 15, 2013. Unlike previous such events, this time scientists had the highly sensitive OMPS instrument on NPP to deliver unprecedented data and help them track and study the meteor plume for months. This video shows how accurately the model prediction coincided with the satellite observations.
For complete transcript, click here.", "items": [ { "id": 307114, "type": "media", "extra_data": null, "title": null, "caption": null, "instance": { "id": 463020, "url": "https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/vis/a010000/a011300/a011336/Meteor_Thumbnail.png", "filename": "Meteor_Thumbnail.png", "media_type": "Image", "alt_text": "A meteor weighing 10,000 metric tons exploded only 23km above the city of Chelyabinsk in Russia on Feruary 15, 2013. Unlike previous such events, this time scientists had the highly sensitive OMPS instrument on NPP to deliver unprecedented data and help them track and study the meteor plume for months. 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This video shows how accurately the model prediction coincided with the satellite observations.For complete transcript, click here.", "width": 320, "height": 240, "pixels": 76800 } } ], "extra_data": {} }, { "id": 345329, "url": "https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/11336/#media_group_345329", "widget": "Basic text", "title": "For More Information", "caption": "", "description": "See [http://www.nasa.gov/content/goddard/around-the-world-in-4-days-nasa-tracks-chelyabinsk-meteor-plume](http://www.nasa.gov/content/goddard/around-the-world-in-4-days-nasa-tracks-chelyabinsk-meteor-plume)", "items": [], "extra_data": {} } ], "studio": "gms", "funding_sources": [ "JWST" ], "credits": [ { "role": "Animator", "people": [ { "name": "Greg Shirah", "employer": "NASA/GSFC" }, { "name": "Horace Mitchell", "employer": "NASA/GSFC" } ] }, { "role": "Video editor", "people": [ { "name": "Silvia Stoyanova", "employer": "USRA" } ] }, { "role": "Narrator", "people": [ { "name": "Mike Velle", "employer": "HTSI" } ] }, { "role": "Producer", "people": [ { "name": "Silvia Stoyanova", "employer": "USRA" } ] }, { "role": "Scientist", "people": [ { "name": "Paul Newman", "employer": "NASA/GSFC" }, { "name": "Nick Gorkavyi", "employer": "SSAI" }, { "name": "Arlindo M. Da Silva", "employer": "NASA/GSFC" }, { "name": "Didier Rault", "employer": "USRA" } ] }, { "role": "Project support", "people": [ { "name": "Swarupa Nune", "employer": "Vantage" } ] }, { "role": "Writer", "people": [ { "name": "Silvia Stoyanova", "employer": "USRA" } ] } ], "missions": [ "NPP" ], "series": [ "Narrated Movies" ], "tapes": [ "Russian Meteorite" ], "papers": [], "datasets": [], "nasa_science_categories": [ "Earth", "Planets & Moons" ], "keywords": [ "Atmosphere", "Bolide", "Chelyabinsk", "Earth Science", "HDTV", "Meteor", "Narrated", "NPP", "OMPS", "Plume", "Polar-orbiting", "Russian" ], "recommended_pages": [], "related": [ { "id": 11325, "url": "https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/11325/", "page_type": "Produced Video", "title": "The Aftermath", "description": "On February 15, 2013, a 59-foot-wide space rock weighing 24,000 pounds screamed into Earth's atmosphere and exploded over Chelyabinsk, Russia, in what became the largest known meteor explosion since the 1908 Tunguska event. Combining observations from the NASA-NOAA Suomi NPP satellite with atmospheric models, NASA scientists traced the trail of dust left behind by the meteor. The researchers found that a belt of dust traveling tens of miles above the surface encircled the Northern Hemisphere just four days after the explosion. The dust initially moved east along the stratospheric jet stream at a velocity of 190 mph. Over time, larger and heavier particles began to lose speed and altitude, while smaller and lighter particles stayed aloft. By May 2013, a thin but detectable dust plume persisted in the atmosphere. Watch the video to learn more. || ", "release_date": "2013-09-03T00:00:00-04:00", "update_date": "2023-05-03T13:51:53.501385-04:00", "main_image": { "id": 462555, "url": "https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/vis/a010000/a011300/a011325/cover-1024.jpg", "filename": "cover-1024.jpg", "media_type": "Image", "alt_text": "Dust from the exploded Chelyabinsk meteor circles the globe.", "width": 1024, "height": 576, "pixels": 589824 } }, { "id": 4094, "url": "https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/4094/", "page_type": "Visualization", "title": "Chelyabinsk Bolide Plume as seen by NPP and NASA Models", "description": "Shortly after dawn on Feb. 15, 2013, a bolide measuring 18 meters across and weighing 11,000 metric tons, screamed into Earth's atmosphere at 18.6 kilometers per second. Burning from the friction with Earth's thin air, the space rock exploded 23.3 kilometers above Chelyabinsk, Russia. The event led to the formation of a new dust belt in Earth's stratosphere. Scientists used data from the NASA-NOAA Suomi NPP satellite along with the GEOS-5 computational atmospheric model to achieve the first space-based observation of the long-term evolution of a bolide plume.NPP's Ozone Mapping and Profiler Suite (OMPS) Limb instrument first observed the dust plume from the explosion about 1,100 kilometers east of Chelyabinsk, due to the location of the satellite's orbit. NPP's second observation was farther west, close to Chelyabinsk, because the spacecraft's orbit moves from east to west. The third observation of the plume occurred the day following the event. The OMPS instrument could only see the plume during the daytime, and the NPP orbit had progressed westward away from the plume and into night by the time it was again over the plume.The OMPS Limb instrument observations are made by looking backward (relative to NPP's orbit) toward the Earth's limb. The instrument makes measurements through three separate slits. Early on, some of the plume observations where only made in one or two of the slits, but later observations tended to include all three slits as the plume stretched out. || ", "release_date": "2013-08-14T13:30:00-04:00", "update_date": "2025-01-05T22:24:46.088657-05:00", "main_image": { "id": 462988, "url": "https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/vis/a000000/a004000/a004094/chelyabinsk_comp.08380.jpg", "filename": "chelyabinsk_comp.08380.jpg", "media_type": "Image", "alt_text": "This visualization shows the how observations by the Suomi NPP satellite's Ozone Mapping and Profiler Suite (OMPS) Limb instrument, and information from the GEOS-5 computational atmospheric model, together revealed the bolide plume snaking around the atmosphere. For complete transcript, click here.This video is also available on our YouTube channel.", "width": 1920, "height": 1080, "pixels": 2073600 } } ], "sources": [], "products": [], "newer_versions": [], "older_versions": [], "alternate_versions": [] }