Research on it began before key radioactive elements had time to decay. To the average person, the SJC meteorite is worth no more than the average rock. Scientifically speaking, it is priceless. However, not everyone knows that the momentary flash of a shooting star is caused, not by a star, but by cosmic debris. Shooting stars are more formally called meteors .
Meteors are pieces of rock or ice colliding with the Earth's atmosphere at high speed.
As these pieces hurtle through the atmosphere, air friction heats their outsides white hot, vaporizing layers of material. Most meteors that you see are the size of a grain of sand. Because they are so small, they burn up in a fraction of a second, leaving only a streak of light in the sky. Occasionally, meteors are large enough that part of them survives the fall through the atmosphere. The object that hits the ground is called a meteorite.