© Calgary HeraldThe Rothney Observatory posted this photo to its Twitter account Tuesday afternoon, saying the object in the bottom-left corner is a fireball over Calgary.
Some Albertans who were up early Tuesday were treated to a rare sight when a fireball lit up the night sky.
The Rothney Observatory reports that a fireball - which is larger than a meteor - was seen at 1:24 a.m. Tuesday.
"They're so bright that if you're standing, you'll see your shadow, just like in the daytime," said Dr. Phil Langill, who directs the University of Calgary observatory.
A meteor is a small rock from outer space that burns up as it enters Earth's atmosphere. Langill said a fireball is even larger.
"Essentially they're the same thing; it's just a matter of scale," he said.
Scores of people took to Twitter and emailed the Herald about the sudden flash of light.
Jesse Shan was on his south-facing Marda Loop balcony when he saw what appeared to be cloudless lightning just southeast of the city.
Comment: What should be more "troubling" is the recent huge increase of cometary activity! Is all the sudden hype about '"space junk" a convenient, plausible explanation to cover up the inconvenient fact that our planet is being subjected to cometary fragment bombardment?
Our immediate cosmic environment IS probably littered with junk left there by certain governments who live by the maxim that the means justify the ends. But it is the height of denial to buy into the notion that all these reports of fireballs we've been collecting are man-made objects. This 'space junk' theme is starting to smell strangely like 'anthropogenic global warming', which provides a plausible - but 'not even wrong' - cover story for Earth changes.
Read Pierre Lescaudron and Laura Knight-Jadczyk's new book, Earth Changes and the Human-Cosmic Connection.