At midnight on Thursday, a gleaming and flashy meteor, usually described as a “green fireball,” caught the sights of people across the UK. It has been spotted by several citizens on their cameras and video doorbells, specifically in Cornwall, Stockport, Southampton, London, Wigan, Manchester, Birmingham, South Wales, Hertfordshire, and West Sussex. However, the same kind of incident happened in January as well, when people across the UK saw a “blue and green” dazzling meteor in the skies of Scotland and England until it was reported that it dissipated in the Earth’s atmosphere before crashing. This time, people were astonished as well as amazed to see this type of occurrence again. One of the witnesses reported that “A light yellow shooting star trail explodes into a ball of off white light after maybe 2 seconds or possibly less. There was a faint roaring sound as it flared from a trail into the ball of bright light.”
A hype was created as people shared the videos and pictures on social media to share this unusual happening. While the UK Meteor Network (UKMON) reported that this “green fireball” had been caught on 15 out of their 153 detection cameras across the UK at 23:39 GMT. UKMON said that the green color of this meteor was due to the excessive amount of magnesium content in it.
Richard Kacerek, the founder of the UK Meteor Network, said, “Preliminary analysis from UKMON data shows the terminal altitude of around 30km above the ground and a velocity of 6.9km/s, which is exciting. This information means there is a potential fall, again! But we might need a scuba suit and snorkel, as any meteorite most likely fell into the Bristol Channel. ” Over 200 public reports have been brought to the UK Meteor Department by the general public.
Another witness captured this fireball on his dashcam while he was traveling towards Bromyard. He explained, “It was extremely impressive and I’m glad I caught it on my dashcam.” All I could see was bright green to start with because the brightness of the meteor was too much for the camera. Then, all of a sudden, I saw the streak of the meteor as clearly as anything. It was incredible.”
On the other hand, some spectators were of the view that the meteor was traveling at a very fast speed due to which they couldn’t capture it. Nevertheless, videos circulating on social media made people excited and curious abour this this uncommon phenomenon.
