This is assuming, of course, that terrorism was involved in bringing down Flight 800.
A very rapidly-moving meteor, that did not happen to make it to the ground, is what struck and passed through the center fuel tank on the plane. There are those who scoff and say that no meteor could be moving that fast, and not be burned up long before it had penetrated so deeply into the earth’s atmosphere. But if it started out large enough, and was moving fast enough, it would have been heated to plasma temperatures as it was ablating, and still have been moving at an extremely high rate of sped if in just that instant, the rapidly shrinking mass intersected with the mid-secton of the aircraft.
The entry or exit hole would not have to be very large, but an impact from something moving that fast has to be carrying a considerable amount of kinetic energy, even if it is quite small by then. The hypersonic shock wave would shatter the structure of the aircraft, causing it to break in two. Because of the physics of the flight path, as the front of the plane broke off, the rear part continued to climb upward, at a rather sharply steeper angle, which would explain the radar images of the plane suddenly climbing.
A very, very low probability of it happening, to be sure, but given enough time, any event could possibly happen, shall happen. To put this into perspective, all jackpots eventually get claimed. This was just the reverse jackpot.