Fire in the SkyS


Fireball

Three meteor fireballs reported over Cheltenham, UK in two days

Phil Norris
Gloucestershire Live
Mon, 20 Feb 2017 23:39 UTC
Brockworth fireball
© Via Facebook/Stef Kotwica
Did you see two fireballs in the sky above Cheltenham on Sunday evening?

We have been contacted by someone who said they saw the phenomenon as they drove along Princess Elizabeth Way.

He asked us via twitter: "Seen two fireballs in the sky when heading down Princess Elizabeth Way. Heard anything?" He added that he was driving with his son and noticed two bright lights which dimmed and left smoke trails. I really can't believe me and my son would have been the only ones to see them, they were bright enough," he said.

Read More...
Fireball 3

Bright meteor fireball seen over northern U.S and Canada

TW
The Watchers
Sat, 18 Feb 2017 15:52 UTC
Fireball over Pennsylvania
A very bright fireball was seen in the northern US and Canada around 04:53 UTC on February 18, 2017. The event was captured in 3 NASA all-sky cameras and cameras belonging to the Southern Ontario Meteor Network.

Analysis of the video data shows that the meteor was first detectable at an altitude of 83 km (52 miles) above US Highway 219, southeast of the Pennsylvania town of DuBois. It then moved northeast some 42 km (26 miles) through the atmosphere at almost exactly 64 400 km/h (40 000 mph), ablating 42 km above the countryside just north of Winslow Hill, NASA's Meteoroid Environment Office (MEO) said.

The camera data shows very little deceleration of the meteor, which gives it a poor chance of producing meteorites, MEO said and added that more analysis is required to rule this out. "The object had the brightness of a quarter Moon, which means we are dealing with an asteroid fragment weighing about 9 kg (20 pounds), with a diameter of roughly 18 cm (7 inches)."

Read More...
Fireball 2

Bright meteor fireball lights up sky in Southern Alabama

Fernando Soto
Local15 NBC
Sun, 19 Feb 2017 18:19 UTC
Alabama Fireball
© NASAThe reports of sound indicate that it penetrated fairly low into the atmosphere before fragmenting, perhaps as low as 14 miles in altitude.
Local 15 has confirmed with NASA that a bright meteor was seen just after 9 p.m. Saturday.

Saturday night reports began circulating on social media about a large fireball in the sky and a loud boom. Residents in Southern Alabama reported that they heard a loud boom that shook their homes. NASA says that the fireball first appeared to the Northeast of Mobile and moved west at about 56,000 miles per hour.

The average brightness is that of the Full Moon, leading experts to believe that it was probably about a foot or two in diameter. Using eyewitness reports and a software tool to derive a ground track NASA was able to conclude that the best reports indicate the meteor broke apart above U.S. 43, just North of Mobile.

The reports of sound indicate that it penetrated fairly low into the atmosphere before fragmenting, perhaps as low as 14 miles in altitude.

Comment: This meteor was also reported in western Florida.

Read More...
Fireball

Valentine's Day meteor fireball spotted over Eastern US


The American Meteor Society
Thu, 16 Feb 2017 18:48 UTC
Meteor Over Eastern US
© Chris Wolf/AMSAMS Event#614-2017 – screeenshot of a video shared by Chris Wolf on the AMS Website.
53 reports from Pennsylvania, Connecticut, New Jersey, New York and Maryland

The AMS has received 63 reports so far about of a fireball event over seen over Pennsylvania on Tuesday, February 14th 2017 around 08:32pm EST (Feb 15th - 01:39 UT.). The fireball was seen primarily from Pennsylvania but witnesses from Connecticut, New Jersey, New York, and Maryland also reported the event. Some witnesses described the meteor as orange, yellow and white. After a fairly extensive investigation, we came to the conclusion that it wasn't Cupidon but a bright meteor.

First Estimated Trajectory

The map below shows the witnesses location with the first estimated trajectory. The preliminary estimated trajectory plotted from the witness reports shows the meteor was traveling from the West to the East and ended its flight somewhere over Scranton, PA.
Read More...
Meteor

Mystery object (possibly a meteorite) lands in UK garden after loud thump in middle of night

Saiqa Chaudhari
Bury Times
Thu, 09 Feb 2017 06:22 UTC
meteorite falls england
© Bury Times
This mysterious rock like object is causing quite a stir in Lowercroft.

Now the couple in whose garden it was found are hoping someone may be able to shed some light on what it is — and where it came from.

Pauline and Norman Pollard were baffled to discover the striking black and yellow material in their garden, just days after hearing a loud noise.

Initially the couple thought it may be a meteorite - and don't know whether the noise is related to the find.

Mr Pollard, who lives in Lowercroft Road, aged 74, said: "We found it in the garden after we had heard a loud bang or thump in the middle of the night, it was like a car door banging."
Read More...
Fireball 4

Bright green meteor fireball illuminates skies over Wisconsin and Illinois

Vincent Perlerin
American Meteor Society
Mon, 06 Feb 2017 08:51 UTC
meteor fireball over Lisle
© American Meteor SocietyAMS Event#454-2017 – Caught on a Police Dashcam (Lisle, IL PD)
Over 170 reports from IL, WI, MI, IN, OH, IA, NY, Ontario, KY and MN

The AMS has received over 170 reports so far (and counting...) about of a fireball event over seen over Wisconsin on Wednesday, February 6th 2017 around 01:27CST (07:31 UT.). The green fireball was seen primarily from Illinois and Wisconsin but witnesses from Michigan, Indiana, Ohio, Iowa, New York, Kentucky, Minessota and Ontario (Canada) also reported the event.

Read More...
Fireball 5

Bright meteor fireball captured over Caeté, Minas Gerais, Brazil

Exoss Citizen Science
YouTube
Tue, 31 Jan 2017 13:16 UTC
Fireball over Caete, Brazil
© Via Twitter@Rainmaker1973
Bright fireball captured over Caeté, Minas Gerais, Brazil on January 30, 2017.

Read More...
Binoculars

Close encounter! Asteroid discovered yesterday whizzed 70,000 km from Earth

Gianluca Masi
Virtual Telescope
Mon, 30 Jan 2017 01:36 UTC
NEO 2017 BH30
The near-Earth asteroid 2017 BH30 was discovered by the Catalina Sky Survey in Arizona (USA) on 29 January 2017 and announced later the same day by the Minor Planet Center: it was going to have a very close encounter with the Earth, at 0.18 lunar distances (about 70.000 km).

At Virtual Telescope Project we captured 2017 BH30 while it was safely approaching us. Above is an image coming from the average of two 60-seconds exposures, remotely taken with "Elena" (PlaneWave 17″+Paramount ME+SBIG STL-6303E robotic unit) available at Virtual Telescope. The robotic mount tracked the fast (36″/minute) apparent motion of the asteroid, so stars are trailing. The asteroid is perfectly tracked: it is the sharp dot in the center, marked with two white segments.

To get these impressive results, the Paramount ME robotic mount tracked using the ephemerides retrieved via the JPL's Horizon webserver. At the imaging time, asteroid 2017 BH30 was at about 500.000 km from us and safely approaching. Its diameter should be around 5-10 meters or so.

The observations provided by the Virtual Telescope Project were published by the Minor Planet Center on its electronic circular MPEC 2017-B121.

Asteroid 2017 BH30 safely reached its minimum distance of about 70.000 km from us on 30 Jan. 2017 at 04:51 UT.

Over the years, our capability to detect small asteroids improved quite a lot, hence the apparently higher numbers of close approaches we see these days.

Comment: That would depend on how soon you want to detect them.

Forget About Global Warming: We're One Step From Extinction!

Read More...
Fireball 3

Meteor fireball observed across 11 southern U.S. states

Spencer Denton
wmcactionnews5
Mon, 30 Jan 2017 20:53 UTC
Fireball
If you saw a bright flash in the sky around 6:16 a.m., it wasn't lightning. It was a short trail, exploding fireball that lasted around three seconds.

Check out this still image captured by ArkansasSky.com near Greenbrier, Arkansas. They caught a big flash on their camera in the lower part of the sky between 20 and 30 degrees above the horizon.

There were several sightings in Collierville and scattered reports from Louisville, KY to Austin, TX. Check out the map to see all the sightings as of 9:30 a.m.

map meteor

Comment: The American Meteor Society (AMS) received 120 reports about a fireball seen over AR, TN, TX, MO, OK, KY, KS, IL, NE, LA and MS on Monday, January 30th 2017 around 12:13 UT.

AMS meteor fireball map 30.01.17
© AMS (screen capture)


Read More...
Fireball

Meteor fireball spotted over Leeds, UK

Grace Newton
Yorkshire Evening Post
Thu, 26 Jan 2017 18:23 UTC
Meteor over Leeds
© Yorkshire Evening PostThe meteor over Allerton Bywater.
Is this a meteor in the skies over Leeds?

Kelly Moss snapped the burning light hovering over Brigshaw High School in Allerton Bywater at around 4.30pm on Wednesday, as dusk was falling.

A meteor, often called a shooting star, is the visible passage of a glowing meteoroid, micrometeoroid, comet or asteroid through Earth's atmosphere, after being heated to incandescence by collisions with air molecules in the upper atmosphere, creating a streak of light via its rapid motion and sometimes also by shedding glowing material in its wake.
Read More...