Fire in the SkyS


Meteor

Fireball sparks panic as it shoots across 250 miles of night sky above California

When a streak of fire blazed through the air above southern California, people could have been forgiven for thinking the Earth was under attack.

Thousands saw it from Phoenix in Arizona to Las Vegas and Los Angeles and local authorities were swamped with reports of ball of flame in the night sky.

One witness said: 'It was huge. It had a green glow in front of it and a white tail. It looked like green fireworks going across the sky.'
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Blazing through the sky: A witness captures the fireball on camera


Question

US: Mysterious light seen in Southwestern sky

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© CNN

What exactly was seen in the skies across the Southwestern U.S. Wednesday night? Was it a meteor, a falling satellite or, perhaps, something more mysterious?

A streak of light that some are describing as a fireball, was seen shooting across the night sky and law enforcement and media from Phoenix to Los Angeles to Las Vegas were fielding calls of the reported sighting.

Lt. Justin Griffin of the Maricopa Sheriff Department in Arizona was trying to guess what the strange light was.

Meteor

US: 2 different objects seen over Phoenix, says witness


Many residents around Arizona have reported seeing a "glowing object" fly across the night sky Wednesday.

Some experts believe it was either a fireball or a bright meteor. We started getting reports of the object around 7:45 p.m.

Meteor

US: Possible Meteor Streaks Across Nevada, Arizona, and Southern California on Wednesday Evening

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© ABC15.com

A bright light across the sky was seen from Las Vegas, Phoenix, and Southern California on Wednesday evening.

Sources believe it was a meteor that came through the atmosphere, however it has not yet been confirmed.

Just after 7:45 p.m. TheWeatherSpace.com tip line was loaded with message of the sighting. Some describe it as a sight they've never seen before.

"I was sitting outside looking at the thunderstorms in the distance and the object caught my eye," said Janet Patton of Palm Springs, California. "It was easily brighter than the full moon and it cast shadows.

Whatever it was, it caused a stir.

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© ABC15.com

Meteor

Fireball sighted in skies over southwestern US

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© FXhome.comGreen fireball illustration
Reports stream in from Southern California and Nevada; experts say it's a meteor

People from San Diego to Los Angeles to Las Vegas reported seeing a large, greenish, fiery object shooting across the sky Wednesday night.

"I saw something that looked like a falling star but it must have been a fireball in the atmosphere," one witness told NBCLA. "It was huge. It had a green glow in front of it and a white tail. It like green fireworks going across the sky."

Witnesses said they saw the fireball around 7:45 p.m. PT (10:45 p.m. ET).

The Federal Aviation Administration said they received many calls about the sky sightings. Initially, there were concerns that the fireball could have been an aircraft. But a spokesman from the National Weather Service told NBCLA that it sounded as if it was a meteor.

Experts said that a meteor is slower than a regular shooting star, and it's not unusual for it to appear to change colors.

In a Twitter update, scientists at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., said that "a lot of lucky people ... saw a fireball tonight" - and pointed to a webpage listing frequently asked questions about fireballs. The report said sightings were made in Arizona as well as California and Nevada.

Meteor

US: Palm Springs Residents Spot Apparent Meteor in Sky

Some Coachella Valley residents spotted something that looked to be falling from the sky tonight, amid reports of a meteor in the Southwest.

It looked like a falling star that continued falling toward the mountain, a Desert Sun reporter in south Palm Springs said.

The Scottsdale Airport tower told police they saw meteor activity around 7:45 p.m., the Arizona Republic reported.

Twitter users from Las Vegas to San Diego have also reported spotting the unusual activity in the sky.

"Okay did anybody else see the giant #meteor or #UFO that fell out of the sky 15 minutes ago?" @ FRUTRON Tweeted.

The National Weather Service said it had not heard of any meteor activity, the Gannett-owned Phoenix paper added.

Palm Springs police said they have not received any calls about the object.

Meteor

Comet Elenin is Now Fading Away

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© Michael MattiazzoComet Elenin on Sept. 14, 2011. It is is now almost indiscernible. Image and annotated chart by Michael Mattiazzo.

As far as Comet Elenin goes, the only chance of impending doom is for the comet itself: it is disintegrating and quickly fading away. Australian amateur astronomer Michael Mattiazzo has been monitoring this comet's trip toward perihelion (closest point in its orbit to the Sun), which occurred on September 10, 2011, and he says Comet Elenin has likely has not survived. The image above was taken by Mattiazzo on today (Sept. 14) and it is barely visible as a disintegrating smudge.

Comet Elenin - the comet that has created a hoopla of completely nonsensical, non-scientific doomsday predictions - faded dramatically after being hit by a solar flare on August 20, as we reported earlier. Subsequent images revealed a spreading, diffuse coma. It will likely continue to fade and become more diffuse.

Elenin's mass is smaller than average and its trajectory will take it no closer than 34 million km (21 million miles) of Earth as it circles the Sun. It will make its closest approach to Earth on October 16th, but was closest to the Sun on Sept. 10.

Meteor

Mysterious 'Booming Sounds' Heard Around World Perplex Scientists

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© Brian EmfingerBrian Emfinger photographed this early Perseid meteor shower fireball, with a smoke trail, from Ozark, Arkansas just after midnight on Sunday, July 26, 2009.
Mysterious booming sounds are occasionally heard on the North Carolina coast, often powerful enough to rattle windows and doors. They cannot be explained by thunderstorms or any manmade sources - their source is a mystery.

Such dins are not unique to North Carolina or the modern age. People living near Seneca Lake in upstate New York have long known of similar booming sounds, which they called "Seneca guns." In coastal Belgium, they are known as "mistpouffers," or fog belches; in the Ganges delta and the Bay of Bengal, "Bansal guns;" in the Italian Apennines, "brontidi," or thunder-like; and by the Harami people of Shikoku, Japan, "yan."

"What's going on is an interesting challenge, whatever it might be," said seismologist David Hill, scientist emeritus at the U.S. Geological Survey office in Menlo Park, Calif.

Meteor

Another Sun Diving Comet

A comet is diving into the sun today. Just discovered by comet hunters Michal Kusiak of Poland and Sergei Schmalz of Germany, the icy visitor from the outer solar system is expected to brighten to first magnitude before it disintegrates on Sept. 14th.

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© SOHO LASCO C3
The Solar and Heliospheric Observatory is monitoring the comet's death plunge: finder chart, movie, latest images.

Sun

More Mammoth Solar Flares Expected From 'Old Faithful' Sunspot, Scientists Say

An active region of the sun that blasted out powerful solar storms four days in a row last week likely isn't done yet, scientists say.

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© NASA/SDO/AIAA giant plume of ionized gas called plasma (to the right) leaps off the sun from sunspot 1283 in this photo snapped by NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory. This sunspot spouted four solar flares and three coronal mass ejections from Sept. 6-8, 2011
Officially, the flare-spouting region is called sunspot 1283. But space weather experts have dubbed it "Old Faithful," after the famous geyser in the United States' Yellowstone National Park that goes off like clockwork. And the solar Old Faithful should erupt again before it dissipates, researchers said.

"It still has a fair amount of complexity," said solar physicist C. Alex Young of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. "So we still have a pretty good chance of seeing some more stuff from this one." [Photos: Sunspots on Earth's Closest Star]