The Tunguska Mistery at Superquark (RAI UNO): 9.20 pm, August 26th 2010

30 JUNE 1908: an unusual day in northern Europe and Central Asia. Anomalous seismic and pressure waves recorded in several observatories; exceptional optical phenomena in the atmosphere, such as massive silvery clouds; brilliant colourful sunsets and bright luminescence in the night skies (in London one could read the newspaper at midnight without artificial lights). The source of these phenomena was identified in a remote region of central Siberia, close to the river Podkamemnaya Tunguska: an area of swampy taiga forests, frozen under ice for eight or nine months every year, far from any permanent human settlement, sparsely populated by scattered groups of nomadic Evenk natives. A number of eyewitnesses on that June 30 just after 7 am were terrorized by a huge fireball crossing the sky from SE, and by one or more deafening thunder like explosions, followed by heat and pressure waves. This is what has been called the “Tunguska Event”. What caused it? The prevalent idea is that on June 30, 1908 a cosmic body, either an asteroid or a comet, impacted with the Earth and exploded in the sky above Siberia. But neither fragments of the cosmic body, nor impact craters have ever been identified in the Tunguska area. The “Mistery of Tunguska” remains.

Due to new data collected by an Italian team composed by scientists from ISMAR-CNR and the University of Bologna, we have now a new scenario for the event, and the finding of an impact crater.