(NECN: Greg Wayland) - The fireball that streaked across Russian skies last week is launching a modern day gold rush.
But modern day prospectors aren't looking for gold: They're looking for space rocks.
Remember the old War of the World movies with invading Martians? Well, not Martians, but meteorite-hunters are invading the Chelyabinsk region of Russia these days, in search of "Chelyabinsk chunks", if you will.
Space rocks of all sizes have long been a hot commodity on eBay, and they sell for pennies or millions.
"The prices that meteorites go for depends on how common the meteorite is, how much of it fell, was there a big story around that meteorite. and was there some particularly rare kind of meteorite, for example, a meteorite from Mars," MIT space science professor Richard Binzel says.
Binzel says the space rock craze has gone global
Greg Wayland has more on the story in the attached video.
