Big Bouncy Meteorites?

Question

Just watched a program about Earth Phenomena, shooting stars and such, atmosphere related.

Thing is, after this Scientist gushed about big massive craters, dotted across the Globe.

A thought occured to me.

What happened to the Meteorite? Did it bounce off? Smash to smithereens?

No mention of Meteor Debris, nothing.

Answer 1

It depends on how big it is.

Currently belief is that a mars-sized object hit the earth and enough of it (well, a melted it and bits of melted earth)  bounced off into space to become our moon.

But I imagine that's fairly rare, and that the answer you're looking for is that "most of it burns up in the atmosphere, some of it melts in the heat of the collision, and if there is any left, it's probably lying somewhere in the crater, possible under the dirt which liquified during the collision, then flowed back like water, and cooled back down to dirt."

But if you walk around some place like antarctica, where you expect to see nothing but white snow and ice, you occasionally find little black iron meteorites lying around, and those definitely 'bounced' in one way or another.

But a HUGE crater can be made by a relatively small object, if it's going fast enough.

Answer 2

What happens on the impact of a large meteorite on Earth is that sufficient kinetic energy is generated by the impact that the meteorite fuses with the Earth's crust. A good example is the area around Sudbury, Ontario, where the impact of a huge meteor 1,850 million years ago enriched the area with nickel, making it one of the richest nickel deposits in the world. Common small meteorites generally lose most of their energy in the atmosphere, so aren't even warm to the touch when they land.