I was just outside a short time ago, at about 9:50pm standing in my driveway when my back yard lit up like a search light was shining in there. I looked up in search of what was making the light to see a huge streak going over the night sky in the ENE direction. Tracing over form North to South and falling off towards the south end. It was extremely bright and easily the brightest Meteor I have seen. My Wife observed something similar a few hours before at dusk to the west. From what she explained not as bright.

  A most unusual phenomena, it seems to me!   A search light?  Meteors glow as they burn in the upper atmosphere.  At 60,000-150,000 ft.+, I doubt it is even possible to create a "searchlight" effect on the surface of Earth--particularly "before dusk". 

   I don't really Know what you saw, but I don't think it was a meteor.

 

Good story.  Good luck figuring it out!

 

 Lucky you covert - I missed it, but heard of quite a few people all across Melbourne metropolitan area and even rural Victoria saw this one !

 

 http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2007/10/03/2049439.htm

 

 I also noticed an article  mentioning this meteor in the other Melbourne newspaper websites (herald sun, and I *think*, The Age, as well .

 

 

 

 

 

 

cyberpatzer wrote:

A most unusual phenomena, it seems to me!   A search light?  Meteors glow as they burn in the upper atmosphere.  At 60,000-150,000 ft.+, I doubt it is even possible to create a "searchlight" effect on the surface of Earth--particularly "before dusk".     I don't really Know what you saw, but I don't think it was a meteor.   Good story.  Good luck figuring it out!

 

 The original poster described it as  his yard was lit up - like - a searchlight;  a similar description from some others gives an idea of just how bright this fireball was.

 

 

cyberpatzer wrote:

A most unusual phenomena, it seems to me!   A search light?  Meteors glow as they burn in the upper atmosphere.  At 60,000-150,000 ft.+, I doubt it is even possible to create a "searchlight" effect on the surface of Earth--particularly "before dusk".     I don't really Know what you saw, but I don't think it was a meteor. Good story.  Good luck figuring it out!

Bright fireballs and bolides can exceed the luminosity of the Full Moon and can easily light up the ground.  I've seen this happen more than half a dozen times over the years.

I have also witnessed a couple of meteors that were bright enough to be seen during daylight.

Dave Mitsky

Very cool indeed. Glad you got to see it and tks. for sharing with us.

cooltech

I had a similar experience last night.  I thought that it may have been a flare but there were no smoke trails or residuals.  It lit up my yard as well.

I too had a similar incident happen during the summer time, I came home from my afternoon at around midnight and I decided to sit on the porch and look up at the sky and relax and I saw a fireball streak overhead, there was also a whizzing/sizzling sound.

Greetings,

 Something simular also happened to me. I was looking up after noticing an extremely bright meteor heading my way. It seemed very big at first and a few seconds later grew dim. Then I heard a sizzling noise and the thing landed on the ground a few feet away, did a sort of a spin and sizzled out. It emited a bright orange or red glow when it hit the ground and did a small bounce like a out of control bottle rocket or something but it was a real meteor or whatever. I looked around for it but it seemed to completely disentigrate and found nothing at all.

Phil from northern California

F4G,

That indeed is one of the most bizarre incidents I've read!  No other explaination?  That sounds like a "close encouter!" All of these posts tell me they were part the "Taurid Meteor Show."  If you have not been to one of my post on "Tauid Meteor Shower Updates" and new post "Leonid Meteor Shower Updates," please take a look at some of the reports and info. there.

Mick @ Canyon Lake, Texas, USA

   On the subject of meteors, I saw an extremely bright one a few months back. It was pure white with a bright blue halo and a pink tail. It was seen at around 6.50pm just around sunset and it moved from roughly my zenith to about 45 degrees above the horizon in about 3 seconds, so was quite slow moving. It was so bright that I could see it through a dark cloud which it passed behind briefly.

   On the same night, about 10 minutes later in fact, I noticed what I thought was a satellite. It was about 60 degrees from the horizon and matched Algol in magnitude (I compared as it passed near to Algol). It travelled from approx North to South but was FAR too speedy to be a satellite or even the Space Shuttle. In the brief time I observed it (about 5 seconds), it covered roughly a quarter of the sky before it faded away. Could this also have been a meteorite? It must have been high in the atmosphere if it was, but it seemed to me like it was 'skimming' the atmosphere before moving away again. I've certainly never seen anything like it before anyway!

Hey Todd33,

Its good to hear from you!  Hope things are well in Northern England.  I'll want to look into this more later today, so check this topic section out later.  Somebody may have an answer already, but your first sighting is unusual to me, and needs a careful look!

Mick @ Canyon Lake, Texas USA

   The first one I saw was definitely a fireball - its trail of smoke was being illuminated by the spectacular sunset I think because it was neon pink. Seeing the actual body glowing reminded me of those Christmas cards, you know the ones with the travelling star and its beams of light? It was quite breathtaking to see actually!

   As for the second sighting, I can't guess what it was. It kinda got me thinking of the 'near-miss' scenario where a rock may seem to be on a collision course with earth but passes by without impact instead. Like I stated, it was fairly bright and seemed like it was high in the stratosphere - like a satellite but extremely fast.

Hey Todd33,

My internet went down three days ago, and got it running yesterday.  Thanksgiving day, and I'm so filled!

Back to your awesome sightings.  The first one definitely sounds like a "bolide at sunset."  Something the "Taurid Meteor Showers would produce.  Wouldn't a video shot of it been priceless?  By the way, if you haven't gone to this "youtude videos site," you got to it and see related videos on the same page.  It's very serious (and) very stupid!  I looked for some old footage of similar sightings of what you saw and will post it soon.

Wait a minute...  I just found a really good example of  a bolide like you saw.  Goto this sight in guadalajara, Mexico!  It was just like the one you saw at sunset!  A more dramatic breakup of a meteor or "space junk"  can be seen in this video!  There are so many to see, I can't post all of them, but here are a few more I like:

Meteor at football game.

Meteorito Madrid.

Meteorito Valencia.

Great documentary video: "Meteoritos."

On the second sighting, my first thought would have been the space station, but it normally would take a minute, or more to cover that much angle.  I haven't seen anything related to this sighting, but a fix on the time, location, and direction would be appreciated, because I'd love to narrow this one down to the "near miss" scenerio you presented.

Also, for fun, goto this "youtube site" for more stupid meteor video footage.  Be sure to see related videos as well.

Mick @ Canyon Lake, Texas USA

 

   That's it! Guadalajara Mexico - almost exactly the same except the tail was shorter! Amazing video, thanks for that

   As for the second one, can't remember the exact date. But the time was around 7pm. It was dark too, so I'm guessing March? I was facing roughly East when I noticed it and it travelled left to right, so from north to south (approx). It didn't burn or fizzle or have a smoke trail, it was just a slightly twinkling point of light moving steadily. Took 7 or 8 seconds I think to move from NE to SE before fading and disappearing. Frightened me a little, was expecting a huge bang at any second, lol!

Hey Todd33,

You're welcome!  I thought it was amazingly close too!

As far as your second sighting, I tried a few sites for anything around that time.  Probably no "near miss" reported.  Bolides may, or may not, have long trails, so like some of the videos above, they can "flicker or flash" as they release larger particles.  Like you described, they appear to head so close to the horizon, that even if they are miles above at their last breath, they sure look terra bound!  Of course many have reached the Earth as seen on documentaries of finds in farm fields and such.  The more recent known asteroid "near miss" was 88,000 km out, but that's close enough!  Oh, did you see this "Peekkill Meteor" and this meteorite fireball?  I going leave you with this awesome "Tacoma Meteor" in case you missed it!

Stay in touch Todd!

Mick @ Canyon Lake, Texas USA

When I was in the US Navy about 1yr ago, we where off the coast of Guam maybe 30 miles, it was the night watch around 2 am I was on the bridge of the ship and looking out and looking towards Guam out of nowhere the bridge lite up like someone turned on the lights and shut them off really fast (no one did that because it is the fastest way to get in a whole lot of trouble, it would blow our night vision and are postion, besides that most of the people up there where sleeping). It was a crazy freak thing that happened but sounds very close to what happen to you.

Agent X,

Great addition to our "figmentation of our realities."  It seems it was quite large.  Bollides are reported from pebble to beach ball size, the latter having a good chance of striking earth!  I hope you saw some of the "best of youtube" videos of these fireballs.  Yes, I bet there were "head rattling" when it went by, and they looking for the guy, or gal, who did it!  Like you say, no one would be that stupid!

Did you, or anyone catch a glimpse of it as it went by?

Mick @ Canyon Lake, Texas USA

Astro.

We did not see it fly by we saw it light the bridge up like daylight i have seen a fireball before i know what one would look like. Springfield ma 2002 around 3 or 4 pm i was walking home from swim pratice and heard a sound that was like what u hear when you cook bacon, i looked up and i saw a fireball in the middle of the sky i of course ran home thinking i just i meteor and wanted to see if it had hit yet, well my mom thought i was nuts until the newpaper the next morning and she saw that it was in the newspaper so she said sorry for yelling at me and sending me to my room for lying:) i will see if the newspaper article is on the net.

Here we go: http://www.nuforc.org/webreports/021/S21759.html

 

Wow, COOL!

I went to that report.  Yeah, and there was another "sizzling" report above in these posts when a small frament supposedly landed near the witness!  Still,  this "fireball" was one of rthe best I have found!  What can I say, except I envy you!  I have spent 300 or more nights out on a sleeping pad and have not ever heard or saw anything like you have.

Mick @ Canyon Lake, Texas USA