Gozer was Sumerian, not Babylonian. Everyone knows this.

The Tunguska Blast actually happened, but not in 1909


Uhm...okay then. When was it? More specifically, what?


The Tunguska Blast, or "Event" was a huge explosion in Russia that took place June 30, 1908 in Siberia. More importantly, it was referred to in the 1984 classic "Ghostbusters" with Dan Aykroyd's character explaining to Rick Moranis's "Louis Tully" that he was part of the "biggest inter-dimensional cross rip since the Tunguska blast of 1909." At the time I watched the movie (and so on up until the time I watched the movie for about the 275th time), I had just assumed that this was some phony made-up para-psychological event to go along with the rest of the movie's fictional canon (I was sad to find that there really is no "Tobin's Spirit Guide" aside from the promotional one offered by the film's producers). As it turns out, I was mistaken. The Tunguska Blast was a very real event, but it happened a year earlier than the film would lead you to believe.

Here are some fun facts!

• The leading theory for the blast is that a meteorite or comet exploded about 5 miles above the earth's surface.
  
• Whatever type of fragment exploded was about 200 feet in diameter, traveling around 22,000 MPH.
  
• Because the explosion took place well above the earth's surface, no direct impact crater was left, leading to rampant speculation about the origin of the explosion.
  
• The blast energy was around 10-15 Megatons of TNT, or about 1000 times as powerful as "Little Boy," the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima.
  
• The explosion knocked over around 80 million trees over an area of nearly 900 square miles.
  
• The shock from an explosion like this would measure about 5.0 on the Richter Scale.
  
• Lake Cheko, a 400mx700m lake in Sibera is believed to have been created by a fragment of the meteoroid involved in the Tunguska Blast.
  

The fact that something like this can happen sounds like something out of a Bad Bruce Willis Movie, but apparently, it happens all the time. Meteoroids about 30 feet across create explosions in the upper atmosphere similar to the "Fat Man" nuclear bomb about once a year. Of course, those are significantly smaller than what we're talking about here, but it still seems a little scary.

Either way, the Tunguska Blast of 1908 was the largest air burst event of its type in recorded history. And due to it's incredible power and the secrecy of the Russian government for a long time after the event, it spawned a number of whimsical theories. Among those, a chunk of anti-matter falling from space annihilated when it came in contact with the atmosphere, a small black hole traveled through the earth, and an alien spacecraft exploded while trying to land on the earth.

The Tunguska Event has at times been labelled the "Russian Roswell" due to conspiracy theories regarding an alien landing. This is most likely what gave rise to its use in Ghostbusters, as the event could be seen as some form of inter-dimensional para-psychological happening, which made it appropriate for the film. They just really should have gotten the date right.