Finding a meteorite anywhere in Canada is something of a rarity. Last July, the first one discovered in Prince Edward Island was extra special, as it is likely the first meteorite impact to ever be recorded with both video and sound!
On a warm July day in 2024, Laura Kelly and her partner left their Marshfield, P.E.I. home to take their dogs for a late afternoon walk. Little did they know that a small rock from space would crash into the ground where they had been, just moments before.
Charlottetown-Meteorite-Strike-thumbnail
The star-shaped impact site of the Charlottetown meteorite, on July 25, 2024. (Laura Kelly c/o University of Alberta)
Although the event itself went unnoticed from outside, the star-shaped splatter of dust and rock on their walkway was an obvious sign that something odd had occurred while they were away.
Initially brushing and rinsing the debris from the walkway, they quickly returned to collect it after doorbell camera footage revealed where it came from: a small rock that showed up in just two frames of the video as it plummeted towards the ground and then disintegrated into a cloud of dust and fragments as it hit.
Charlottetown Meteorite Strike – frames composite
This composite image combines three consecutive frames of Laura Kelly’s doorbell video from July 25, 2024, at exactly 5:02:20 p.m. Atlantic time. The newly discovered Charlottetown meteorite shows up in two frames, as it entered the camera’s field of view (top right), closer to the ground (centre right, possibly as two fragments?), with the third frame showing it striking the ground (bottom right). (Video courtesy Laura Kelly via the University of Alberta. Composite by Scott Sutherland)
On the off chance this could turn out to be a meteorite, Kelly and her partner gathered as much of it as they could using a magnetic and vacuum. They then reported their find using the University of Alberta’s Meteorite Reporting System.
Coincidentally, Dr. Chris Herd, the curator of the University of Alberta’s meteorite collection, was vacationing in P.E.I. with his family shortly after this meteorite fell from the sky. After connecting via their report, Herd met with them while on vacation and collected a sample of the rock for study. His examination determined that this was, indeed, a meteorite, likely originating from the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter.
Charlottetown meteorite collections Jul-Aug 2024
The collected samples of the Charlottetown meteorite are shown here, gathered on July 25 (7g), August 2 (16g), and August 8 (72g), 2024, for a total sample mass of 95 grams. Most of the fragments have a lumpy appearance (the “chondrules”), with colours ranging from light brown to dark orange. Also visible are several pieces that appear dark grey, which indicate they were part of the “fusion crust” that formed on the surface of the meteorite as it was flash-heated by its passage through the upper atmosphere. (University of Alberta Meteorite Collection)
It is now officially known as the Charlottetown meteorite, and is classified as an ‘ordinary chondrite’, the most common type of meteorite. Chondrites are collections of tiny rounded particles (“chondrules”) that formed when melted minerals congealed and froze in the zero-g of deep space, and then became cemented together over time by accumulated space dust.
For potentially billions of years, this rock had been threading its way between the inner planets and all the objects in the asteroid belt, again and again as it orbited the Sun.
Unlike all of its previous trips, though, on this latest spin around the inner solar system, Earth got in its way, turning it from meteoroid to meteor to meteorite.
Meteoroid-Meteor-Meteorite-Fireball-Bolide-NASA-ROM-GoogleEarth-SSutherland
(NASA/Royal Ontario Museum/Google Earth/Scott Sutherland)
READ MORE: Got your hands on a space rock? Here’s how to know for sure
How did it go unnoticed?
Whenever a meteorite is found, it’s safe to assume that at some point in the past — whether minutes ago or millennia — it was preceded by a bright flash of light in the sky. However, there were no reports of any fireball seen over Atlantic Canada on July 25, 2024. In fact, Kelly’s video of the meteoroid is the only sighting of any kind for the Charlottetown meteoroid prior to impact.
So, what happened? Why wasn’t anything seen or heard before this meteorite hit the ground?
This particular meteorite hit the ground at just after 5 p.m., nearly four hours before sunset for Marshfield on July 21. Although there have been exceptions, in most cases, it’s difficult to notice a fireball meteor passing through a bright, daytime sky. Those that have been spotted were either exceptionally bright, or the person happened to already be looking up and in that direction at the time.
NYC Daytime Fireball Meteor – July 16 2024 – Mark Kirschner
This rare daytime fireball was spotted over New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut just after 11 a.m. EDT on July 16, 2024. (Mark Kirschner/AMS)
However, there was an added complication in this case. At the time of the meteorite fall, sky conditions over the area, as reported by the nearby Charlottetown airport, were Mostly Cloudy.
Other than odd types, such as noctilucent and nacreous, typical clouds over southern regions of Canada are found between the ground and around 12 kilometres up. Meanwhile, the flash from a meteor occurs much higher, usually above 80 km, with the rare exceptional one reaching down to around 30 km above the ground. Any sound produced by a meteor also originates that high up, when it is travelling at supersonic speeds, and it’s rare for these sounds to reach our ears at ground level.
Thus, the meteor flash from this event was either lost in the daylit sky or completely obscured by clouds.
As for the meteoroid, once the flash went out, it entered what’s referred to as ‘dark flight’. Basically, it became a rock falling from the sky at terminal velocity, emitting no light and cooling rapidly on its way towards the ground. Due to its small size, it would have been impossible to see between emerging from the cloud base and reaching the field of view of Laura Kelly’s doorbell camera.
Three historic ‘firsts’ from this meteorite
According to The Meteoritic Society, prior to this, there were only 68 known meteorites discovered in Canada. These were found in every province and territory except for Nova Scotia, Nunavut, and Prince Edward Island.
The Charlottetown meteorite is now the very first to be found in P.E.I., but it also makes history in two other ways. It’s the first meteorite impact to be captured on video, and the first where the sound of the impact was recorded as well.
“As the first and only meteorite from the province of PEI, the Charlottetown Meteorite sure announced its arrival in a spectacular way. No other meteorite fall has been documented like this, complete with sound,” Herd, a geologist who uses meteorites to study the planets, moons, and other objects in our solar system, said in a press release. “It adds a whole new dimension to the natural history of the Island.”
READ MORE: Want to find a meteorite? Expert Geoff Notkin tells us how!
A rough past
The Charlottetown meteorite is somewhat odd in one other respect, too, as it completely shattered when it hit the ground.
Meteoroids are subjected to extreme heat and pressure as they fly through the air. This scorches their surface into a dark fusion crust and often causes them to explode. Still, even after enduring all of that, they tend to be remarkably resilient. Meteorites often survive completely intact after impacting at speeds of a few hundred kilometres per hour.
A closer look at the interior structure of the Charlottetown meteorite fragments may explain why it blasted apart, though.
According to Herd, thin slices of the fragments revealed fracturing through the rock, which indicated to him that it had endured collisions while it was out in space. That likely weakened its internal structure, and then hitting the hard surface of the walkway was just the last straw.
“This rock was probably just barely hanging on when it actually hit the ground, and happened to run into the walkway as opposed to the grass, and then just completely shattered,” Herd told The Weather Network.
Watch below: The most pristine meteorite sample in the world is being housed in Canada, see it
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