A huge fireball crosses the sky above the Kanto region at around 2:32 a.m. on July 2. (Captured from a video taken by Kagaya)
A huge fireball crosses the sky above the Kanto region at around 2:32 a.m. on July 2. (Captured from a video taken by Kagaya)
A bright meteor crossed the sky above Tokyo early Thursday, with many people saying they heard it explode.

Social media came alive after the 2:30 a.m. sightings, with many people saying they heard a large bang. Some said they mistook the sound for noise made by neighbors.

"I thought a person living (in the condo) above knocked down a shelf," wrote one Twitter user, while another said, "I thought my child sleeping on the second floor fell out of bed."

Others witnessed the sky suddenly light up.


Daichi Fujii, a curator at Hiratsuka City Museum in Kanagawa Prefecture, captured the fireball with a camera installed at his home in Hiratsuka. It crossed the northern sky from west to east, he said.

The National Astronomical Observatory said several fireballs are observed every month on average, but it is rare for people to hear anything.