A meteorite that dramatically punched a hole through a Georgia homeowner’s roof last month has been officially identified by scientists as being older than the Earth itself, offering a rare glimpse into the primordial solar system.

University of Georgia planetary geologist Scott Harris announced Friday that fragments of the space rock, which blazed across the sky in a fiery streak on June 26, formed an astonishing 4.56 billion years ago – predating our planet’s formation by roughly 20 million years.

The dramatic entry of the meteorite was witnessed by residents across several Southern states, who reported seeing a mysterious fireball streaking across the broad daylight sky, hurtling towards the ground faster than the speed of sound. The fiery spectacle culminated in a direct hit on a home outside Atlanta.

According to Harris, a piece of the meteorite, described as being the size of a cherry tomato, “struck a man’s roof like a bullet and left a dent in the floor of the home.”

Harris and his team at the University of Georgia, along with colleagues at Arizona State University, examined 23 grams (0.8 ounces) of the recovered meteorite fragments. Examining these under specialized microscopes, Harris concluded its ancient origin.

“It belongs to a group of asteroids in the main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter that we now think we can tie to a breakup of a much larger asteroid about 470 million years ago,” Harris stated in a press release.

The scientific team plans to submit their findings to the Nomenclature Committee of the Meteoritical Society. They have proposed naming the extraterrestrial visitor the “McDonough Meteorite,” reflecting the Georgia city where it made its dramatic descent to Earth.