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Video: "Huge" Fireball Zips Through Night Sky, Crashing In Poughkeepsie
By
David Cruz
Published Nov 9, 2020
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By
David Cruz
Published Nov 9, 2020
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New York was among ten states where observers spotted a fireball careening through the night sky on Sunday.
The sighting came at 7:22 p.m., with multiple dashcams from New Jersey capturing the bright rock and its fluttery tail streaking across the sky. It was seen in the five boroughs, lighting up Twitter with users who were unsure what they saw.
"Saw it in Downtown BK, was highly alarmed we were being bombed," tweeted one Ryan K. "It was huge."
It also caught the attention of the American Meteor Society -- a group that tracks meteor activity from around the country -- which received roughly 210 calls about the fiery rock.
"Several thousand meteors of fireball magnitude occur in the Earth’s atmosphere each day," AMS wrote in explaining the meteor, which hasn't been named yet. "The vast majority of these, however, occur over the oceans and uninhabited regions, and a good many are masked by daylight. Those that occur at night also stand little chance of being detected due to the relatively low numbers of persons out to notice them."
The group mentioned that on top of New York and New Jersey, the meteor was spotted in Connecticut, Massachusetts, Delaware, Maryland, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Vermont, West Virginia, and Québec.
AMS said the meteor crash-landed in Poughkeepsie, 75 miles north of New York City.
The fireball -- a term used to describe an extremely bright meteor on the same magnitude as Venus as seen in the morning or evening sky -- comes on the heels of last weekend's blue moon that garnered attention on Halloween.
It also comes just as a meteor shower event dubbed the Northern Taurids is expected to peak between November 11th and 12th.
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David Cruz
David is a former WNYC and Gothamist editor.
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