Reports coming in of large fireball over US East Coast (NJ MD DC VT NY PA ME MA VA WV DE) 2013-03-22

This appears to have been a fairly bright and fairly long duration natural (for a meteor/fireball) fireball that also fragmented in-flight. No reports of sonics as far as I can tell, but this wasn't quite on the scale of the recent Russian fireball. No footage either yet, but many people in 11 states saw this, so I would not be surprised if some footage turns up. There have been some "fake" photographs posted already though.

Here's a small sample of some of the reports that have so far been posted:

22MARCH2013 Cliff Livesay Sykesville, MD, USA 19:55:00 4 sec W-E Bright white Moon No Caught it from the corner of my eye out the window, watched it streak acrross and burn out.

22MAR2013 Mark Nucker Ellicot City, MD 21042 19.57 2-3 seconds left to right north to east green-blue bright as moon don't know moved quickly descending

22MAR2013 Eric Schwartz Middletown, DE USA 19:55:00 ~2 seconds N-E Fasing NE multi-colored aqua orange, red bright as the mood it seems like little flashes of light traled off the main object, object disapeared after a coupled of seconds, cloudless conditions none

22MAR2013 Stephen Clarksburg, MD, United States 7:56 PM EST 4 seconds South East White, yellow and orange. Huge Full moon bright Yes one piece fell off It looked like 20 times the size of a normal shooting star. looked very close. and had a very long tail

22MAR2013 Pankowski Rockville, MD 19:54 (Eastern) 4-5 seconds West to East (facing north) White with white then green tail Same as moon Had a tail Very bright, headed in a slight downward direction

22MAR2013 Jim Towson, MD, USA 20:50:00 4 - 4 seconds Facing northeast, tarveled north to east Green with a yellow tail / no sound At least as bright as the moon None observed Beautiful!

22MAR2013 Lucas Springfield, VA 1952 Eastern 8 NNW to SSE Blue/no sound A little brighter than a full moon. No None

22MAR2013 M laRoi Mt airy, md 1950 approx 10 + sec West to east Bright white Bright like a spotlight Slight Just a bright meteor

22MAR2013 Aashima Kapoor Melville, NY USA 19:58 EST 10 sec N-S Burning blue and orange Same as the moon No Slow moving across the sky

22MAR2013 Michael Norquist Baltimore MD 19:53:00 Duration 3-4 seconds East to West Green Fire ball with long white tail Sun Large ball Caught it at the very end of the decent but I must have been within 75-100 miles of it because it was very large and clear in color and form

22MAR2013 Andy Voyer MAPLE SHADE NJ 1950 3-5 seconds in view Facing NE/ traveled N-S Long tail Green in color Brighter than moon sparkled like parts falling off and burning up. had a long tail blew my mind

22MAR2013 hank schwedes delran, nj, usa 19:55 edt 10 sec w to e white/yellow/green no sound moon no arced across sky until behind building.

Source: lunarmeteoritehunters

Just to remind everyone, the jury is still out on there having been an increase in fireball class events as I posted
here.


Related links:

The American Meteor Society Fireball FAQs
Reports of yesterday's fireball from The American Meteor Society

Hey Fireball

Thread already here buddy!

reply to post by woogleuk


Thanks woogle

It would be on the one sub-forum I didn't check!

Apparently it was seen in MA too but I missed it...

Reporting from Westchester ny. Just seen it twice and they were so beautiful in color


Had enough time to tell my brother n my friends to turn around n look up and it was so amazing seeing the beautiful colored trail

reply to post by burntoast


I've always been amazed at the colours I've seen in some meteors. They aren't always intense, but when they are, they are spectacular, and there is plenty of variation. I think many people are surprised by this if they see a colourful meteor/fireball.

Well done catching a nice pair

EAST COAST METEOR WAS SHOT DOWN THREE TIMES!!!

Take a look these vids of the east coast meteor streaking through the sky...check out the left portion of the screen (8-9 o clock)...three flashes of light...the first apparently missed...but the SECOND WAS A DIRECT HIT (coinciding with the meteor disintegrating midflight)...the third missed methinks...compare with the russian meteors being shot down vids....





CNN VID


WMDT SOURCE VID

Wow , interesting find.....maybe all these meteors are man made and launched for target practice for something else on its' way or some somethings on their way.....muahahaha

just kidding....great catch !!
Makes you wonder....and this site is great for that.

Well, the main thread has become a bit of a joke, so I'm going to post an update here instead.


As of writing today, the AMS had received 1207 reports from 21 states of this event, making it the most reported event on the AMS database since 2005 when the database was incarnated in it's current form.

The interactive map of witness reports is looking a bit crowded to say the least:

Source: AMS


Some nice images of the fireball have also surfaced:

Here is a remarkable pair of pictures taken by Biologist and Amateur Meteor Astronomer Carl Fuller of the Greater New York City Area. Carl installed an astronomy camera on his roof 9 months ago and was hoping to capture some meteor trails. Looks like he caught the mother load.

Source: AMS




Animation:



I'd encourage anyone reading this to consider installing a camera themselves to catch fireballs, and a guide can be downloaded from here.

There is also another way (using different software/hardware from the way described in the link above) to set up a fireball camera, and more info on the subject can be found here.

ATS member Trillium has a setup similar to that above and after a few months has already captured a few meteors, one of which was very nice as some of you may have already noticed.