The History of Ming states only that there was a rain of uncountable stones up to the size of goose eggs. Additionally, there are records of it in local gazettes and histories of the region. One source of Chinese astronomical information of celestial events, the Zhongguo gudai tianxiang jilu zongji (Complete collection of records of celestial phenomena in ancient China), records ten works that discuss the March–April 1490 event, including the History of Ming. All of the people in the city fled to other places. More than 10,000 people were struck dead. The larger ones were like goose's eggs and the smaller ones were like water-chestnuts. The larger ones were 4 to 5 catties (about 1.5 kg), and the smaller ones were 2 to 3 catties (about 1 kg). Stones fell like rain in the Ch’ing-yang district. Kevin Yau of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory and his collaborators have noted several similarities of the Ch'ing-yang event to the Tunguska air burst in 1908, which, if it had occurred above a populated area, could have produced many fatalities. ĭue to the paucity of detailed information and the lack of surviving meteorites or other physical evidence, researchers have been unable to definitively state the exact nature of the dramatic event, even examining the possible occurrence of severe hail. However, the History of Ming omits the number of casualties, which therefore has been frequently either doubted or discounted by present-day researchers. The History of Ming (the official history of the Ming dynasty) contains a report of the event, and other journal records which describe the event are also generally considered reliable. Meteor shower Īt least three surviving Chinese historical records describe a shower of rocks, one stating that "stones fell like rain." Human fatality estimates in these sources range from more than ten thousand people to several tens of thousands of people. In the same year, Asian astronomers coincidentally discovered comet C/1490 Y1, a possible progenitor of the Quadrantid meteor showers.
The casualties are therefore doubted by many researchers in the modern era. Some historical Chinese accounts of the meteor shower recorded many deaths, but the official Ming dynasty history records the event without mentioning casualties. A 1994 study in the journal Meteoritics tentatively explained this event as a meteor air burst. The area was at the time part of Shaanxi, but is now in Gansu province.
The Ch'ing-yang event of 1490 (also Ch'ing-yang, Chi-ing-yang or Chíing-yang meteor shower) is a presumed meteor shower or air burst in Qingyang in March or April 1490.
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