Meteorite Impact

Small objects enter the atmosphere constantly and burn up. The ones that could cause damage are tracked from the ground: NASA focuses on finding those 140 meters or larger, since they pose the most severe impact risks, with the goal of detecting at least 90% of them with enough advance warning.

The four scenarios. A rock the size of a house is not the same as a mountain: size doesn't change the degree of the problem, it changes the whole problem.

1 · Up to about 25 meters — explodes in the air

It almost never reaches the ground: it breaks up in the atmosphere. The damage comes from the blast wave, not the impact. In Chelyabinsk (Russia, 2013) a house-sized object broke apart at an altitude of about 23 km, released energy equivalent to roughly 440,000 tons of TNT, broke windows across an area of several hundred square kilometers, and left more than 1,600 people injured, almost all of them from broken glass. It is by far the most likely scenario.

2 · From 25 to 140 meters — local destruction

It can flatten a city or an entire region. The documented reference is Tunguska (Siberia, 1908): an object of this size exploded in the air and leveled forest across about 2,000 km². If there is a warning, evacuate the area designated by the authorities.

3 · From 140 meters to 1 kilometer — regional devastation

This is the threshold NASA monitors as a priority. The effects exceed those of any known natural disaster in the affected area, and if it falls in the ocean, the main problem becomes the tsunami.

4 · More than 1 kilometer — global effects

It stops being a local problem: dust thrown into the atmosphere alters the climate and agriculture for years. At the extreme end of this category is the roughly 10 km impact associated with the end-Cretaceous extinction, about 66 million years ago. It is, by an enormous margin, the least likely scenario.

• Follow only official monitoring sources: NASA and the International Asteroid Warning Network publish the objects they track.
• Be skeptical of any specific impact date circulating on social media: if a real-risk object existed, space agencies and your civil-protection authority would announce it — not a viral video.
• Have your family plan ready and your go-bag packed: it is the same one that works for every other emergency.

• Get away from windows, glass panels, mirrors, and hanging objects; turn your back to them if you can't leave the room.
• Protect your head and neck, just like in an earthquake.
• If you are outdoors, take shelter in a solid structure or a depression in the ground, away from glass and building facades.
• After the blast wave, expect broken glass everywhere: put on closed shoes before you move.
• Don't drive toward the affected area. Keep the roads clear for emergency services.
• Follow the battery radio and official civil-protection accounts; don't spread rumors.

The immediate effects — damaged buildings, broken glass, utility outages — closely resemble those of an earthquake. The Earthquake guide applies almost entirely for the hours that follow.

Where it falls changes the main danger.

If it falls on land

The danger is the blast wave, collapses, fires, and dust. Act as you would after an earthquake: don't enter damaged buildings, check for gas leaks and electrical hazards before reconnecting anything, and protect your airways from the dust with a face mask while it stays in the air.

If it falls in the ocean

The main danger stops being the impact and becomes the tsunami. Move away from the coast and go up to high ground: hills, mountains, or the upper floors of a solid building if there's no time to leave. Don't return to the shore until the authorities say it's safe: several waves can arrive, and the first one usually isn't the biggest.

If you're on the coast and don't know where it fell

Treat it as a tsunami warning: go up to high ground and wait for official information. It's the decision that costs the least if the alarm turns out to be false, and the one that saves the most if it isn't.

• Don't approach fragments or the impact site: there can be hot material, unstable ground, and utility outages.
• Document the damage to your home with photos before you clean up.
• Expect extended outages of power, water, and phone service: the same measures from the power outage guide apply.
• In a scenario with regional or global effects, the problem that lasts the longest is the supply shortage, not the impact.

The family plan for this scenario is the same as for any other: a meeting point, routes, a single out-of-area contact, and someone responsible for each person who needs support. It's laid out step by step in the flood guide, and the same fill-in format works here.

How to store it so it works when you need it

The CDC calls for approved food-grade containers with a tight-fitting lid, made of a sturdy, unbreakable material —never glass— and with a narrow mouth for pouring. An explicit warning: never use a container that has held toxic chemicals such as bleach or pesticides. And what almost everyone forgets: stored water should be replaced every 6 months. To disinfect the container before filling it, use a teaspoon of unscented household bleach per liter of water, wait 30 seconds, and pour it out.

What food to keep on hand

Ready.gov recommends several days of non-perishable food and gives a concrete list: ready-to-eat canned meats, fruits, and vegetables —and a can opener—, protein or fruit bars, dry cereal or granola, peanut butter, dried fruit, canned juices, and pasteurized long-life milk. The rule when putting it together is simple: food your family will actually eat, that needs no cooking, and that you can rotate before it expires.

• Keep the refrigerator and freezer closed: every time you open one, you waste hours of stored cold.
• Throw out any food that has touched floodwater, even if the container looks intact. This is an explicit Ready.gov instruction.
• Keep a manual can opener. It is the item people forget most, and without it your pantry is useless.
• If you buy bottled water, keep it sealed in its original container, in a cool, dark place.

When the cell network is overloaded: text, do not call

The joint FCC and FEMA guide explains why: "text messages may get through when your call does not", even if delivery is delayed when the network is congested. And it asks for something almost no one does: "limit non-emergency calls", because every call takes up space that emergency communications need. Also save a contact under the name "ICE" (In Case of Emergency), the convention rescue personnel look for on someone else's phone.

How to stretch your battery

The same guide recommends lowering screen brightness and turning off apps to conserve charge. In an emergency your phone stops being entertainment and becomes your only line to the outside world: treat it like your water supply.

The battery-powered radio is still irreplaceable

The FCC and FEMA recommend a battery-powered radio or a portable television to follow emergency bulletins during power outages. It is the only channel that depends on neither your electricity nor the cell network.

The alerts you already have and did not know about

In the United States, Wireless Emergency Alerts are free messages that go straight to your phone for severe weather, AMBER alerts, and threats to safety in your area. Two things worth knowing: you do not need to sign up —phones have supported them since 2012— and they are not affected by network congestion, so they get through when calls no longer do. Find out what the equivalent system is in your country, and do not mute it.

• Have at least one light source that does not depend on the grid: a battery-powered or hand-crank flashlight, or a rechargeable lamp.
• Charge phones and backup batteries before the forecast event arrives, not after the power is already out.
• Keep a list of important phone numbers on paper: if your phone dies, your contacts die with it.
• Agree with your family that after an emergency everyone texts the same contact instead of calling each other.

This is the section that decides who has a hard time and who has a dangerously hard time. An emergency does not suspend diabetes, high blood pressure, pregnancy, or dependence on an oxygen concentrator: what gets cut off is access to the pharmacy, the clinic, and electricity. Everything that follows needs to be prepared beforehand, because once the emergency hits, there is no more room.

1. Keep a reserve of your medications, and know which ones hold up. Ready.gov calls for a several-day supply of prescription medications. For those that need refrigeration, the CDC is blunt: once the power has been out for a day or more, discard any medication that requires refrigeration, unless its label says otherwise.
2. The insulin exception, worth knowing word for word. The FDA documents that insulin in the manufacturer's original vials or cartridges —opened or unopened— can stay unrefrigerated between 15 and 30 °C (59 and 86 °F) for up to 28 days and still work. It loses effectiveness at extreme temperatures, and the longer the exposure, the less effective it becomes. In an emergency "you may still need to use insulin that was stored above 30 °C" —that is better than not using it at all— but as soon as proper storage is available again, those vials should be discarded and replaced.
3. If someone depends on electric medical equipment, there is one step almost no one takes. Ready.gov says it explicitly: you can ask your power company to put you on a priority list for service restoration. That step is free, can be done on any ordinary day, and changes the order in which you get reconnected. Add a backup battery for an electric wheelchair and for any assistive device, and talk with your doctor about how to keep the equipment running during a power outage.
4. Keep a copy of medical information, not just the pills. A list of medications with dosages, allergies, diagnoses, doctors' contact information, and —for infants— the vaccination record. A prescription bottle cannot always be refilled at a pharmacy in another city; a written list can solve that.

Pregnancy and newborns

The CDC calls for prenatal vitamins and other medications in the kit, plus supplies in case delivery happens without being able to reach a hospital: clean towels, clean sharp scissors, a bulb syringe, gloves, two clean white shoelaces to tie the cord, clean sheets, sanitary pads, soap or alcohol, and garbage bags. For infants: diapers, wipes, ointment, bottles, and formula. One detail that matters: ready-to-feed formula is the safest option in an emergency, because it does not need to be mixed with water and comes in sterile, single-use containers.

Disability, reduced mobility, and older adults

Ready.gov stresses planning accessible transportation in advance for evacuating or getting around, and including a service or support animal with its food, water, and supplies. That plan should be worked out with specific, named neighbors, not left vague.

The blow that comes later: mental health

The CDC names the normal reactions after a disaster —fear, anger, sadness, worry, numbness, frustration, trouble sleeping, or nightmares— and recommends taking care of your body, staying in touch with other people, and taking breaks from the news. In the United States and its territories, the Disaster Distress Helpline is available 24 hours a day: 1-800-985-5990, with service in Spanish. Asking for help here is not weakness: it is part of recovery, just like repairing the roof.

1. Before you go back in: look, smell, and listen from outside. The CDC lays it out this way: if you smell gas or suspect a leak, shut off the main valve, open all the windows, and get out immediately. If there is standing water inside and you can cut the power from a dry spot, do it. And one simple warning that prevents explosions and fires: use battery-powered flashlights, not candles, gas lanterns, or torches.
2. Ventilate before you settle in. The CDC recommends going in briefly to open doors and windows, and letting the house air out for at least 30 minutes before staying inside.
3. Shutting off utilities: when to do it, and the mistake you cannot make. Gas has a rule with no exceptions: if you shut it off for any reason, only a qualified professional can turn it back on. Never turn it back on yourself. Electricity is shut off by switching off the individual circuits first and the main breaker last —the order matters, because an electrical spark can ignite gas if there is a leak—. Water should be shut off if pipes may have cracked, because that contaminates the house supply, and should not be turned back on until authorities confirm it is safe to drink.
4. Go back only when authorities say it is safe. It sounds obvious, and it is the instruction people break most often: go back home only when authorities say it is safe. Structural damage is not always visible from the street.

• Make a photo inventory of what is in each room today: it takes twenty minutes and is worth its weight in gold for a claim.
• Keep that inventory and your policies outside the house —in the cloud or with a family member— because a file that gets soaked along with the house is useless.
• If you have to leave, take your documents with you, not your furniture.
• Do not sign anything with a contractor while you are in shock: check the money section for the warning signs of fraud.

The documents you need to protect today

The official recommendation is to keep insurance policies, deeds, property records, and other important papers in a safe place outside the house. FEMA publishes the Emergency Financial First Aid Kit for this, organized into four sections: household identification, financial and legal documentation, medical information, and contacts. Its rule for paper: a fireproof and waterproof box or safe, a bank safe-deposit box, or in the hands of someone you trust. For digital files: password-protected files on an external drive or in secure storage outside the home. And if you pay everything online, print your account records periodically.

An emergency fund, even a small one

The CFPB avoids magic formulas: "the amount you need depends on your situation", but "even a small amount can provide some financial security". Its underlying argument is the one that matters: without that cushion, a single unexpected expense can grow far larger than the original bill through interest and fees, because it forces you to rely on credit.

The realistic scenario for a small meteor — by far the most likely — isn't a crater: it's a shock wave that shatters windows for miles around, as happened in Chelyabinsk. The demand it creates looks a lot like that of an explosion: glass, windows, and cuts.

• Glass replacement and installation, the dominant demand, which can overwhelm local glass shops.
• Safe removal of broken glass in homes, schools, and businesses.
• Temporary coverings of plastic, wood, or acrylic while the permanent glass arrives.
• Security film for windows, which keeps glass from shattering outward; it sells much better right after the scare.
• First-aid kits and care for minor cuts.
• General cleanup of interiors full of glass shards.

It helps to start with one figure to size up what we're talking about: according to the ILO, informality affects nearly half of the employed population of Latin America and the Caribbean, around 47%, with huge differences between countries — under 30% in Uruguay and Chile, over 70% in Bolivia and Peru. For millions of families in the region, "looking for a job" and "starting something on your own" are the same sentence. What follows is not a promise of income: it is a map of what people actually do when a crisis hits, with the requirements and the risks laid out plainly.

Glasswork and temporary coverings

When demand outstrips local glass shops, the viable business isn't always cutting glass: it's a well-made temporary covering — measuring, cutting wood or acrylic, fastening, and sealing — that lets a family close up their house that same night. Low investment, and the same customer often hires the permanent installation afterward.

Security film for windows

It's the equivalent of furniture anchoring after an earthquake: a cheap preventive measure almost nobody takes beforehand and everybody wants afterward. It requires learning the bubble-free application technique, little more. It sells best in schools, offices, and businesses with large windows.

Specialized shard cleanup

Sweeping isn't enough: fine glass stays in carpets, sofas, and toys for weeks. With a strong vacuum, adhesive rollers, and a method, you offer a service families with small children value highly. Gloves and closed-toe shoes are mandatory, and it's worth telling the customer to keep children away during the work.

United States — SBA disaster loans

For areas with a declared disaster. The Economic Injury Disaster Loan (EIDL) provides working capital for affected small businesses and nonprofit organizations; the physical damage loan covers losses not covered by insurance. Combined cap of $2 million, interest not exceeding 4% if you cannot obtain credit elsewhere, terms of up to 30 years, and the first payment deferred 12 months. There is also a line for homeowners (up to $500,000) and for renters for personal property (up to $100,000).

Mexico — what actually exists today

FONDEN stopped taking on new commitments on January 1, 2021. What operates today in emergencies is PAEAN, run by Civil Protection, and it is worth knowing exactly what it is and is not: it delivers relief supplies — food kits, water, blankets, roofing sheets, cleaning materials — when a state's own capacity is overwhelmed. It is not a reconstruction fund or a loan for your business. For capital, look at state, municipal, or development-bank programs, always verifying on the official website: fraud schemes that use its name circulate around these programs.

Brazil — Pronampe for micro and small businesses

A credit line for microenterprises (annual revenue up to 360,000 reais) and small businesses (from 360,000 to 4.8 million). The amount can reach up to 60% of the previous year's gross revenue for businesses with more than one year in operation, and up to 50% for new ones. The maximum rate is the SELIC rate plus up to 6% per year.

Site guides that cover the concrete effects of this scenario:

• Earthquake — protecting yourself from collapses and broken glass, and what to check afterward.
• Power outage — living without electricity for days.
• Supply crisis — when it is the supply chain that breaks down.
• Food crisis — stretching the pantry when prices rise.
• Combined crisis — several emergencies at once.