Meteorite that landed in Botswana tracked to its birthplace in the asteroid belt
By Nicoletta Lanese - Staff Writer 19 hours ago
Fragment of asteroid 2018 LA recovered in Central Kalahari Game Reserve in central Botswana. (Image credit: SETI Institute)
A small asteroid barreled through the sky and burned up over the Kalahari Desert of Botswana in the summer of 2018 and now, scientists suspect that the space rock originated from Vesta, the second largest asteroid in the solar system.
The small asteroid, named 2018 LA, was first observed through a telescope at the University of Arizona's Catalina Sky Survey and looked like a speck of light whizzing through the stars, according to a statement from the SETI Institute.
"This is only the second time we have spotted an asteroid in space before it hit Earth over land," Peter Jenniskens, a SETI Institute meteor astronomer, said in the statement. "The first was asteroid 2008 TC3 in Sudan 10 years earlier."
More:
https://www.livescience.com/meteorites-botswana-from-vesta-originally.html
