Meteorite (biome)

A crashed meteorite is a medium-level event location. A meteorite crash site may spawn at midnight with a 50% chance when a Shadow Orb is smashed. Additionally, each night, there is a 2% chance that a meteor will fall (if at least one Shadow Orb has been broken in the world).

Event
You will be notified by a chat message: "A meteorite has landed!" when a meteorite strikes the surface. This happens at midnight, or immediately after smashing a Shadow Orb when midnight has passed, but it's still night.

The meteorite will land somewhere on the surface, replacing dozens of blocks deep with Meteorite in a roughly circular pattern. Touching it itself will burn you and knock you back unless you have an Obsidian Skull accessory equipped. A Cobalt Shield will prevent the knockback, but you will still be hurt by the Meteorite.

Note that if you have built a single-block bridge (even one composed of wood platforms) in the sky in search of Floating Islands it is possible for a meteorite to land on that bridge and you will end up getting only a small amount of Meteorite. It is suggested to destroy any paths in the sky before smashing a Shadow Orb in order to get a normal amount of Meteorite.

Note also that when it is stated that the meteorite can land 'somewhere on the surface,' these locations can include both the Floating Islands, inside of a corruption chasm, along with the Dungeon.

Use
You can mine Meteorite ore from the impact site, allowing you to craft Meteorite Bars at a furnace and craft a variety of equipment.

Meteor Heads will continuously spawn and attack you while you mine. They can pass through all blocks and fly, so it can be quite difficult for characters without good armor or weapons to attempt to mine the Meteorite.

Once most of the Meteorite has been mined (less than 50 Meteorite remain unmined; about 10%) the music will change back to normal and Meteor Heads will stop spawning, although the remaining Meteor Heads will still attack. Afterwards, the remainder of the Meteorite can be safely mined or ignored.

Mining Strategy
If you can get all existing Meteor Heads on one side of you, you can mine the Meteorite with your pickaxe and at the same time cause the pickaxe to knock back any Meteor Heads which approach. Note that of Terraria version 1.0.5, the Meteor Heads will not be knocked back the other way. Instead, they will be stuck in place when you hit them.

Dynamite is very useful for mining meteorites, a single stick thrown onto roughly the center of the Meteor will demolish much of the ore. Sticky Bombs are also suggested, you can throw several sticky bombs onto the Meteor and then back off, fight off the Meteor Heads, and allow the bombs to explode and mine the ore for you. It is also possible to mine the meteorite by tunneling under it, but this is highly not recommended unless the creatures of the corrupt (which spawn even in a meteorite biome with a meteorite in it and meteor heads spawning) are there. In that case digging under is your best bet so the corrupt monsters (besides the worms) can not get to you. If you do tunnel, use sticky bombs inorder to make the process quicker. Just plant the bomb, run to the other side of the tunnel, and get the meteorite.

Monsters in Meteorite Biome

 * Meteor Head