Fire in the Sky
Astronomer David Lane, director of the observatory at Saint Mary's University in Halifax, said it was likely a bright meteor called a fireball.
He said that while they are not rare, they do usually pass by in the middle of the night when most people are sleeping.
The ball of fire was reportedly seen by people in the Annapolis Valley, Antigonish, Sydney and even some on Prince Edward Island.
"It grew brighter as it streaked low on the southeastern horizon and expired with a bright green flash," said Emily MacKay on Twitter
Nova Scotia Webcams captured the fireball on its Halifax harbour webcam.
After multiple fireball sightings last year, Lane told CBC the odds of finding a meteorite after seeing a fireball are small.
"The chances of finding it are pretty slim. You really need a lot of good camera reports that shows the streak in the sky so that scientists can follow up ... to do, essentially, a triangulation and pinpoint a target search area."
He said finding a meteorite is very rare. Only one meteorite has ever been confirmed to have been found in the Maritimes.
"Fireballs happen all the time," Lane said. "There's something like 100 tonnes of stuff that hits the Earth every day from space, but [in] Nova Scotia, or I should say the Maritimes, there's only been one meteorite ever found on the ground."
Nova Scotia Webcams caught the thing on camera:
Reader Comments
LOL........... carefix, you got a way with words. I lean t your side a little with better reporting and a monthly breakdown but not plateauing. BTW how's Itsy going? still on track??
Itys. OK, the only reason I mention Itys (often) on this site is I am hoping the readership might report the next encounter which is due sometime this year based on previous sightings 2002/3, 2007, 20011.......2015. Of course the next visit could be the final one in which case it is absolutely too late. There is very little chance of doing anything about Itys now as our technology is too primitive but it is our only chance so I do my best to save the world.
I do not know the track of Itys although I have worked out the only realistic orbit. A period of four years is way too long for a two body orbit. Of course the period could be apparent, I can only go on reported sightings and some may be missed. For example I did not see the 2011 pass but there were several reports from Eastern Australia (I think it was June 17th without looking it up) where most witnesses reported the large black head fringed with ruddy orange flame. Fireballs are not black/dark in general but asteroids are (with some flame) as the atmospheric flow is more akin to that of a pyroclastic flow. I have offered an illustration of Itys to SoTT but they do not believe in killer asteroids reported by astrophysicists. They prefer to ignore such evidence in favour of the beliefs of paid matrix dwellers. The darkness of the head means the angle distended by the eye is a true angle. This enables an accurate size estimation. From this I can say Itys is 5km +/- about 2km. The upper limit is an Earth destroyer, the lower is almost as bad.
Itys is absolutely terrifying if you are close when it comes through. Itys spends most of its time sunwards of Earth and close to the Lagrange 1 point. On previous sightings it is due back at some point this year. If we are not close to New Moon then we are likely to survive again. With the moon sunward there is a chance that an orbital perturbation could bring Itys in to stay. If we are very lucky Itys might just hit the moon, but that is unlikely.
Itys always travels South to North - closer to SSE to NNW - and will do until the inevitable happens. Obviously I do not have enough data to compute the next arrival date. I can only say it will be possible between now and say August. I favour late May onward.
Keep your eyes peeled.
what's the big deal? they land here all the time; and some of the travelers come in for coffee ~ they all look like Martians to me.
....the increases in fireball numbers are not just due to improved reporting - I suspect they are to some extent - then the above chart is quite worrisome. It does however seem to be plateauing which has to be good news although this is hardly clear when data is presented on a yearly rather than a monthly basis. It would be instructive if the data could be broken down into smaller time slots.