The trail of glowing, electrically-charged gases that surrounds and streams away from the meteoroid is called a meteor. When heated to incandescence by friction with air in our atmosphere, they burn up completely at heights of about 80 km - 130 km. The small particles which become meteors typically range from the size of a grain of sand up to the size of a pea. Tiny dust particles get rid of heat as quickly as it is applied, so do not burn up and fall gently on the Earth's surface. Very small meteoroids may remain intact or melt to form glassy droplets which rain down on Earth's surface as micrometeorites. meteorites: larger meteoroids survive their fiery ordeal and land on the Earth's surface.meteors: the initial solid particle (meteoroid) can be too small to survive its flight through Earth's atmosphere and burns up completely when heated by friction with air, to give a momentary streak of light.What is the main difference between meteors and meteorites? Rarely, meteoroids may come from the Moon, Mars or comets. Bodies within this belt range from dust particles up to small planetoids (asteroids) such as Vesta (525 km in diameter). Most come from the asteroid belt lying between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter, about 400 million kilometres from the Sun. Meteoroids, which are solid pieces of extraterrestrial metal or rock debris, can be knocked out of their orbits in outer space and be captured by Earth's gravity.

Stony iron meteorite