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A huge green fireball streaked across the sky over Britain last night.
Doorbell cameras across the UK captured the object at around 00:30 BST.
’00:26 anyone see that big meteor burn up just now?’ North Yorkshire Weather Updates asked on Facebook.
Hundreds of viewers have replied, with many revealing they mistook it for a rogue firework.
‘I saw that. It was bright green. It was massive. I thought it was a firework at first it seemed so close,’ one user replied.
Another said: ‘Yes I saw it walking home in Derbyshire. Looked like a firework the colours it was giving off. Glad I read this…wasnt sure what Id seen.’
And one joked: ‘Yep my bathroom lit up I thought I was hallucinating… lol.’
While the fireball may have been slightly alarming, there’s a simple explanation – it’s a meteor.
Incredible footage has revealed the moment a huge green fireball streaked across the sky over Britain last night
Keith Spirit captured a photo of the fireball as it zoomed through the skies over Northumberland last night
Videos filmed across the UK show the fireball zooming towards the Earth, before bursting into bright green.
Thankfully, it then disappeared, suggesting most of it burned up before reaching the ground.
‘Saw that from the M62 and I’m still buzzing! Can’t believe how bright it was!’ one viewer wrote on Facebook.
Another said: ‘Camera on edge of the moors in Winterburn just caught it.’
And one quipped: ‘see we go round the moon and now we have space rocks been thrown at us,’ in reference to NASA’s Artemis II mission.
Fireballs that explode in the atmosphere are technically referred to as bolides.
‘During the atmospheric entry phase, an impacting object is both slowed and heated by atmospheric friction,’ NASA explained.
‘In front of it, a bow shock develops where atmospheric gases are compressed and heated.
Videos filmed across the UK show the fireball zooming towards the Earth, before bursting into bright green. Thankfully, it then disappeared, suggesting most of it burned up before reaching the ground.
‘Some of this energy is radiated to the object causing it to ablate, and in most cases, to break apart.
‘Fragmentation increases the amount of atmosphere intercepted and so enhances ablation and atmospheric braking.
‘The object catastrophically disrupts when the force from the unequal pressures on the front and back sides exceeds its tensile strength.’
Around the world, thousand of fireballs occur daily.
However, most are unnoticed because they happen over oceans, uninhabited regions, or during the day.
