Meteor that exploded in spectacular fireball over Niagara Falls was surprisingly small

Sign up to our free weekly IndyTech newsletter delivered straight to your inbox Sign up to our free IndyTech newsletter Sign up to our free IndyTech newsletter SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy policy A meteor that exploded in a spectacular fireball over Niagara Falls in 2022 was the smallest asteroid ever measured, a new study has found. The space rock, dubbed 2022 WJ1, broke apart due to friction as it entered the Earth’s lower atmosphere in the early hours of 19 November 2022. Timelapse image of meteor fireball event from start to finish Once astronomers spotted the space rock heading towards the Earth, they positioned instruments along its predicted path to closely monitor it through the atmosphere. “Through a comprehensive comparison of telescopic and meteor camera analyses, we can thus conclude that not only do the two sets of techniques agree on the properties of WJ1, they also both support that the object was the smallest asteroid compositionally characterised in space,” scientists said.