In the latest Dreamworks animated feature, Monsters vs. Aliens, a radioactive meteorite crashes a wedding, causing the bride-to-be to outgrow the church. The movie, a throwback to ‘50s-era B monster flicks, made us wonder if space rocks have ever caused real harm to humans. We reached out to Owen B. Toon, an atmospheric scientist at the University of Colorado at Boulder.

Do big meteors enter earth’s atmosphere?
A car-sized object enters the atmosphere every year and blows up with the energy of a small atomic bomb. Fortunately this happens high up in the atmosphere so no damage is done.

But a really big asteroid did take out the dinosaurs, right, at the end of the Mesozoic era? Should we be worried?
The extinction of the dinosaurs clearly shows that a collision with a mountain-size object could devastate life. This could also happen to us. The statistics are a little odd. For instance, every year a small number of people, perhaps 100, die in airplane crashes. At this rate it would take 60 million years to kill everyone on earth. On the other hand, objects like the one that killed the dinosaurs probably hit the earth about every 60 million years, and would likely kill almost everyone on the planet.

Is there any souvenir remaining from the dinosaur meteor?
The crater of the object that killed the dinosaurs is buried, but you can see it from space as a ring of cenotes, or sink holes, in the Yucatan Peninsula. There is a layer of debris, about as thick as a dime, from this impact that covers much of the Earth... exposed in places such as Italy and Wyoming.

But so far, humans have been unscathed?
Nothing of significance. It is quite possible that serious events have occurred in human history and we just haven't identified them yet. There have been several small objects that hit cars or people. A few people have gotten rich from finding meteorites, or having their cars or houses hit by them.

You can get rich by getting hit by a meteorite?
Meteorites can be valuable as collectors items. For example a car hit by a meteorite was sold for a large sum, and their was a law suit between a home owner and a renter over who owned a meteorite that hit the renter while she was lying on a couch. I don't follow this market, but you can find it on the web.

—Paul Heltzel

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