green fireball
© Klaas Jobse
On the night of November 19th, amateur astronomer Klaas Jobse captured a green meteor/fireball over the Dutch village of Oostkapelle.

Estimating the size of the fragment as that of a large marble, Jobse told regional broadcaster Omroep Zeeland that "such a fragment of a comet enters the atmosphere with a gigantic speed and then a spectacular reaction occurs, with this fireball as a result."

While he suspects the meteor fragment originates from the Leonids, he remarked that a great fireball such as this one is extraordinary. "It was pretty clear, so you could see it beautifully. And it was very bright. I think you can compare it with the light of a full moon. Yes, for an amateur astronomer, this is the icing on the cake."

See the footage of the fireball in the video below (00:11-00:15):


Jobse is a gardener, but has several observatories on his own premises. He spots fireballs often, but this one was special according to him. "That's because of its size, as most fireballs are about the size of a grain of sand, but also because of its speed, which probably had a velocity of around 70 kilometers (43 miles) per second," he told Omroep Zeeland.

zeeland meteoor
© Omroep Zeeland/Klaas JobseOne of the observatories in Jobse's backyard in Oostkapelle.
As can be seen from the Fire in the Sky section and our SOTT Earth Changes Summaries, sightings of meteor fireballs are occurring more and more often.