In the early morning of June 19, in several southern US states, including Texas, Missouri, Arkansas, Oklahoma, and Kansas, several eyewitnesses reported the same thing: a bright flash in the sky followed by a booming sound.
What they saw was a massive fireball streaking over the sky in a breathtaking astronomical event.
A massive fireball in the sky
According to a report by BGR, the fireball was quite massive, which is why it was visible across several states in the southern United States. And now, scientists are compiling all the reports from the regions where it was visible.
Experts from the American Meteorological Society (AMS) have already compiled nearly two dozen reports of this single event as they are tasked with tracking every sighting of various objects in the sky across the country.
For those who weren't lucky enough to see the massive fireball, AMS was able to acquire a couple of videos that are now available to view so you can at least see what the lucky stargazers have seen. There's also a single photo from the same event taken by one of the witnesses.
Caught on Camera
Based on the video that is now uploaded on YouTube, it's hard to miss the fireball if you're outside as the sky glowed quite brightly when the fireball streaked through the sky.
Additionally, it lasted for a good few seconds, and if we're to look at the compilation from the AMS, eyewitnesses would say it lasted around five seconds or so.
In the video, the fireball glowed a bright green glow, and after a second or two, it exploded and burned brighter before the light faded in a couple of heartbeats.
Eyewitnesses even heard a booming sound, which they described as a "cannon," as the space rock exploded into tiny pieces. And if some of those small rocks have survived the nasty fall from space into Earth's atmosphere, they might have reached the surface.
It won't be surprising that some meteorite hunters have begun the search for even a tiny piece of the space rock and with plans to offer it to experts or museums for an extra buck.
Breaking into tiny pieces
One witness from Oklahoma even said to the AMS that he saw the giant fireball break into two pieces right after it exploded in the atmosphere. He was also able to capture the event which was published by the AMS. Fortunately, there weren't any reports of damages or injuries that occurred from the event.
A few days before the event in the southern US, witnesses from western Australia were also able to see a fireball in the sky, which some were also able to capture a video of. According to experts, the fireball might have been a distant asteroid.
Earlier this month, a huge asteroid also zoomed in between the Earth and the Moon, which is exceptionally close and might have caused a catastrophe in the event it collided with the planet. In a past report by Tech Times, experts were only able to discover the asteroid a couple of days after it passed by us.
