There’s already some fun stuff happening in the sky this week with Mars at its closest and brightest in a decade, easily visible at night—and brighter than any star—along with Jupiter and a dimmer Saturn (seriously, go outside and look south tonight). Space is apparently determined to give us a show, though, and a meteor exploding over Phoenix, Arizona was brighter than them all by far.
In fact, it was bright enough to reach fireball status (brighter than any of the planets in the sky) as it streaked through the sky and left a sonic boom in its wake Thursday morning at 3:56AM—much brighter than any of the planets, as you can see in the video above that it practically turns night into day. Even more impressive: That show was put on by a meteoroid only about 5-10 feet in diameter by NASA’s estimation, and the video was recorded over 70 miles away from the fireball.
That’s a lot smaller than the most devastating fireball in recent memory: the 20-meter one that exploded over Chelyabinsk, Russia, and injured almost 15,000 people. Even at its much smaller size, this one in Phoenix hit the atmosphere with such force that it left a seismic signature measurable in the Earth’s crust with its shockwave. Take another look at a video that catches the fireball itself on camera (there’s plenty more where that came from):
Way cool! Andreww Tegga sent this video of the possible #meteor from his dash cam this morning. #abc15 pic.twitter.com/2bfIZ2XvCp
— ABC15 Arizona (@abc15) June 2, 2016
(featured image via tonynetone on Flickr)
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