Overnight Sky Poll: Did anyone else see meteors--of the fireball sort--last night?

Question

I spotted one, but I'm not sure if it was a natural meteor or just a satellite of some sort.

I live in the Central time zone of the U.S.A., and spotted this around 1:15 a.m. last night. It was a fireball moving *northeast* across the eastern sky, and apparently a meteor or fragment either passed *through it* or broke off of it as it went by. It looked like a double-meteor effect, first the fireball and *then* the dimmer sort of shooting star, which puzzles me.

Did anyone else spot anything like this last night?

Answer 1

Usually, I'd advise you to report all fireball sightings to AMS. The last few time I checked, their fireball sighting report form returned Error 404.



Below is the 2009 fireball log. They are about a week behind in publishing reports. I guess that is so they can filter out the bad ones.

Answer 2

What you saw was probably a bolide meteor.



We are almost at the Geminid Meteor shower. You can start to see some.

http://www.skyandtelescope.com/community/skyblog/observingblog/78835207.html



There are hundreds of meteors that streak through the atmosphere of the earth each and every day and night. There are times when the earth passes through what was the path of a comet and our atmosphere will pick up a lot of tiny specks of dust left behind from that comet. When that happens, it is called a meteor shower.



There are many meteor showers every year. ★ Meteor showers can occur several days prior, and several days after, their projected peak time. ★ Think about the rotation of the earth. As the Earth spins, it moves into the path of the dust in space so you want to look mostly towards the east and near the constellation that the shower is named for. The darker the sky in your viewing location, then the more you can see of even the fainter meteors. If you are in a light polluted area, you will only be able to see the biggest and most bright meteors. They are best to watch if you have a friend with you.



http://www.imo.net/calendar/2009

This is the 2009 calendar of meteor showers from the International Meteor Organization.



They put the 2010 calendar on a pdf file this year so you can save it to your computer. Here is their link for that.

http://www.imo.net/docs/cal2010.pdf



Their home page can tell you how to get the very most out of your meteor shower viewing experience.

http://www.imo.net/

Answer 3

We are constantly bombarded with meteorites. Some of them simply break apart due to the intense impact with our atmosphere.

Answer 4

Yes I did where I live.

Answer 5

LMAO, I'm sorry I just saw "of the fireball sort" and had to laugh