The Tunguska Event

By Nigel Watson | Published in History Today Volume: 58 Issue 7

Nigel Watson recalls a mysterious explosion that occurred in deepest Siberia in June 1908.

At 7.17am on June 30th, 1908, a huge object exploded six miles above the Stony Tunguska River area, central Siberia, causing an atmospheric shockwave that circled the Earth twice. For the following two nights the skies of Europe and Asia were unusually bright. The glare in the sky was compared to the atmospheric effects that followed the volcanic eruption at Krakatoa in 1883.

This article is available to History Today online subscribers only. If you are a subscriber, please log in.

Please choose one of these options to access this article:

Purchase a online subscription and receive unlimited access to our archive for one week, one month or a year

Purchase a print and website subscription, giving you one year's access to all our content and 12 editions of History Today magazine.

If you are already a print subscriber, purchase the online archive upgrade for a year's worth of access at a reduced price

Call our Subscriptions department on +44 (0)20 3219 7813 for more information.

If you are logged in but still cannot access the article, please contact us

Tags: Archaeology,Russia,

If you enjoyed this article, you might like these:

This Month's Magazine

Subscribe to our weekly e-newsletter:

From The Current Issue

History Today App

From The Archive

Lords of the Northern Forest

The Hudson's Bay Company was one of the central forces moulding the development of the vast tracts of land that today are Canada - but as Barry Gough explains here, the circumstances of its launch in 1670 also reveal much about the commercial forces, personalities and rivalries of Restoration England.