Fireball over northern Italy - September 03, 2013

A bright fireball has been seen over northern Italy aroud 02:12 local time (00:12 UT) of September 03, 2013.

Recently we installed an All-Sky camera on Mount Matajur Observatory - Italy (MPC Code B68). This all-sky camera is the first step toward remote observing from Matajur Observatory as it will be very important to check the sky conditions before the observing sessions and to image transient phenomena like yesterday fireball. While the camera is still in the testing phase, it has been able to image the flash by this bright fireball. See our video below showing the flash from the fireball and the frames just before and after the event. Click on the thumbnail for a bigger version.

Below you can see an image & video of this Fireball imaged from Ferrara by a meteor-cam station of IMTN ( Italian Meteor and TLE Network ) group.

Some witnesses in the Veneto region have reported hearing sounds (such as explosions) after the passage of the fireball.

On the same night, at 02:26 local time (00:26 UT) - 14 minutes after the Fireball - our All-Sky camera imaged another bright meteor. You can see the image and the animation below (click here or on the thumbnail for a bigger version). 

by Luca Donato, Ernesto Guido & Massimiliano Travagini

Fireball over Wisconsin - Missouri , April 14

A bright fireball has been seen over Wisconsin aroud 10:00 p.m. local time of April 14, 2010. The fireball has been seen from Wisconsin to Missouri. National Weather Service offices in La Crosse, Wisconsin, Davenport and Des Moines, Iowa, and St. Louis and Kansas City in Missouri all received numerous reports.

Many surveillance cameras should have recorded the night-landscape illuminated by the fireball.

The fireball was caught on a webcam from University of Wisconsin-Madison Department of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences:

Please click on animation to see a bigger version

(Credit: UW-Madison AOS/SSEC)

The fireball was also caught by a Howard County Iowa Sheriff's Deputy.  Also the Doppler Radar from the National Weather Service in the Quad Cities appeared to capture a portion of the smoke trail from the fireball at 1002 PM local time (CDT), as seen in the image below. It appears as a thin line extending across portions of Grant and Iowa Counties in Wisconsin. Click on the image to see a bigger version.

By Ernesto Guido

Fireball over Hungary, February 28, 2010

A bright fireball has been seen over Hungary aroud 23:24 local time (22:24 UT) of February 28, 2010. The meteor was spotted from Slovakia and Southern Poland too. Many surveillance cameras have recorded the night-landscape illuminated by the fireball.

This is an animation captured at 22:24:49 UT 28.02.2010 by the "Polish Fireball Network" showing the fireball flash as seen from Poland:

(Credit: Szamotuły, Poland M.Reszelski)

The following one is the best video (taken by another CCTV camera) available at present showing the bright fireball in the sky:

Here you can find other videos related to this fireball uploaded on youtube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mvJkhiUUAT8

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t6HFlC0U4Lo

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=resXhksKBZY


by Ernesto Guido

South African Fireball - November 21

After the Utah Fireball on Nov. 18, another bright fireball has been seen over South Africa aroud 11pm local time of Nov. 21, 2009. The meteor was spotted by dozens people as it passed over Johannesburg and Pretoria in Kauteng province on Saturday. Below the footage from a security camera in Burgersfort in the Limpopo Province:

(Credit: Christo van Graan - Burgersfort)

While below you can see a CCTV footage of the fireball over the skies of Gauteng

by Ernesto Guido

Utah Fireball - 18 November 2009

On Nov. 18, just after midnight local time (MST) a great fireball was seen over parts of the western United States. According to Spaceweather website witness in Utah, Wyoming and Idaho saw "remarkable midnight fireball that turned night into day. It was not a Leonid. Infrasound measurements suggest a sporadic asteroid not associated with the Leonid debris stream. The space rock exploded in the atmosphere with an energy equivalent to 0.5 - 1 kilotons of TNT"

Many surveillance cameras have recorded the midnight-landscape illuminated by the fireball:

(click to enlarge)

Here you can find other videos of the fireball uploaded on Youtube.

Few hours after the fireball, strange clouds appeared in the dawn sky. These clouds are strikingly similar to the debris left in the sky after the 2008 TC3 event in Sudan on Oct. 7, 2008.

by Ernesto Guido

Leonids 2009

According to preliminary counts from the International Meteor Organization (IMO) the Leonids meteors reached a ZHR(max) ~ 120/130 around 22UT of Nov. 17, as predicted by forecasters.

The ZHR surge, witnessed by observers in Asia, occurred when Earth passed through the debris left from Comet 55P/Tempel-Tuttle in 1466 AD and 1533 AD. When Earth exit these streams, the ZHR count fall to the value ~30/40.

Our meteorcam starting to image at 23:30 UT of Nov. 17. In 5 hours of imaging, our camera detected 35 meteors, of which 26 were leonids. This is a composite of the brightest meteors (mostly leonids) imaged by the meteorcam from 23:30 UT of Nov.17 to 04:30 UT of Nov. 18 (because the images were collected over several hours, the radiant of the shower is spread out):

While checking online all-sky cameras around the web, I found this nice fireball imaged by the Sbig All-Sky camera on Nov. 17 at 02:20am local time:

Below  you can see the video sequence showing the fireball and its trail:

by Ernesto Guido

Netherlands Fireball - October 13, 2009

A bright fireball has been reported to streak across the sky in the Netherlands by many observers at approximately 1658 UT on Oct. 13th. The bolide breaks apart into a half-dozen fragments, and a trail in the sky remained visible for many minutes.

(Credit: Jan de Vries)

(Credit: Robert Mikaelyan, The Netherlands)

(Credit: Maciej Libert, The Netherlands)

According to Spaceweather website: "Royal Dutch Meteorology Institute listening post detected strong infrasound (low-frequency sound) waves, apparently confirming a high-altitude breakup event". More images of both the fireball and the trail can be seen here.

Several thousand meteors of fireball magnitude occur in the Earth's atmosphere each day. Most occur over the oceans and uninhabited regions and many are masked by daylight. The brighter the fireball, the more rare is the even.

by Ernesto Guido