Meteors+and+Meteorites

= Jesse Robinson, Jayden Fitzgerald = 

= //__ meteors and meteorites __//= **Small pieces of space debris (usually parts of comets or asteroids) that are on a collision course with the Earth are called //meteoroids//. When meteoroids enter the Earth's atmosphere they are called //meteors//. Most meteors burn up in the atmosphere, but if they survive the frictional heating and strike the surface of the Earth they are called meteorites.**

** The Earth has been struck by many meteorites, some quite large. The adjacent image shows the Barringer Crater in Arizona. It is 1.2 kilometers across and 200 meters deep, and was formed about 49,000 years ago by the impact of a 50 meter nickel/iron meteorite travelling at a speed of 11 kilometers per second .**