The Tunguska Mystery: The 1908 Airburst That Flattened a Forest Without a Crater
In 1908 a space object exploded over Siberia in an airburst, releasing roughly 10–15 megatons of energy and flattening about 80 million trees across 830 square miles, with no crater and a ring of standing trees at the center. Scientists still debate whether it was a stony asteroid or a comet; the asteroid answer fits the ground damage while the comet explanation could account for the eerie skyglow seen across Europe. No fragment has ever been found, and the event helped spur modern planetary defense efforts, including NASA’s DART mission.