MYSTERIOUS FLASH

 February 1955

A.A. Shackleton and others report seeing a mysterious flash about 6:30 pm Tuesday evening in the sky north of town, followed by a roar three or four minutes later.  George Day, while driving, and his passengers, also saw a flash south of Iona, and a report came that it was observed at Colvim. 

Mrs. F.E. Appel, who lives at the boundary, comes up with a report that they had a winter electrical storm in their vicinity at that time. 

One would hardly call this flurry a typical "meteor shower"...but what kind of an incursion from space was it?

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OBJECT THOUGHT TO BE METEOR IS FOUND HERE

 February 1955

A visitor from outer space dropped in on the Nevison Antique Shop, 5151 Park Blvd, Pinellas Park, Wednesday night, in the form of a small meteor. 

"I heard a noise on the roof about 10 p.m.," Nevison said, "and looked out the front door.  There was a black object on the sidewalk which looked like a toad."

 But when Nevison's cat avoided the object, he took a closer look and found it to be a lump about the size of a silver dollar and three times that thickness.  He noted raised markings "almost like letters."

 Several friends and neighbors have told Nevison the object is a meteor.  He plans to check with an authority for positive identification.  No damage was reported.

 Even the shape of that little item is like the little stone Tarbes, France, reported by Charles Fort.  And the size:  a few millimeters thick and about an inch in diameter!

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BIG METEOR SEEN OVER LOCAL AREA

February 1955 

Charles Dare, local businessman, and other Melbourne area persons, reported today that they saw a big meteor flash across this section last night. 

Associated Press dispatches reported that the meteor was said to have looked "like a ball of fire 10 to 15 feet in diameter," and flashed across South Florida before it burned out over the Everglades.

Hundreds of persons from Central Florida to Cuba reported seeing it.  Several motorists near Miami reported they swerved to keep from being hit.

Pilots flying over Fort Pierce and Key West reported it as did two pilots flying the Atlantic between Miami and Nassau.  A ship near Cuba radioed it had seen the meteor:

"I thought it was coming in the window of my plane," said Capt. Francis Black, Eastern Air Lines pilot en route to Miami.  "I was over Fort Pierce at the time on a trip from Detroit.  It looked like a ball of fire 10 or 15 feet in diameter.

"I took my plane up about 1,000 feet to keep from getting hit but I felt a little foolish when I got to Miami and learned that a pilot flying over Key West did the same thing."

The Miami Weather Bureau took a sober view of the occurrence:

"It was no different from hundreds that fall every night.  It was a big one but it probably burned out at about 20,000 to 30,000 feet over the Everglades about 30 or 40 miles southwest of Miami International Airport."

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FROM OUTER SPACE EXPLOSIVE VISITOR! 

February 8, 1955 - Miami Beach Sun

South Floridians were still talking about their "visitor from outer space" today.  The big question is "which way did it really go?"

 The visitor was a big blue-green meteor that flashed across the sky last night, then exploded as dozens of pilots and thousands of excited witnesses on the ground watched.  As in the case of certain more controversial aerial phenomena, there were almost as many versions as there were witnesses.

 Two airplanes as far apart as Ft. Pierce and Key West--a distance of nearly 300 miles--tried to "dodge" the fiery ball.  Several motorists near Miami Beach said they swerved to avoid being hit.  Another pilot at Havana, Cuba, reported the meteor went right over his plane.

 Other spectators who swamped radio, newspaper and police switch boards with calls described it as "big as the moon," "a crashing plane," and "a big green saucer with a long, white tail."

 Hank Tonkin, public service meteorologist, had a less imaginative explanation.  The meteor was "a big one," said Tonkin, "but no different from hundreds that fall every night--except that this was closer to Miami."

 Newspapers all up and down the coast of Florida reported the weird experiences of drivers and pilots when the green fireball passed over. 

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1/29/2005

Madrid - Residents of the area near Madrid airport reported seeing a ball of fire explode and disintregrate in skies over the Spanish capital overnight, security services said.

Emergency services received telephone calls about 10:30 pm (2130 GMT) Thursday reporting the object, described by some callers as looking like a meteorite, which was seen exploding and disintegrating.

Subway employee Jose Antonio Lopez told EFE news agency that when he went home from work, some 50 kilometres (30 miles) from the capital, he saw a "huge, very red incandescent ball giving off a huge flash then disappeared after a few seconds."

"It was a mass of red fire falling vertically," he said, suggesting it could have been a meteorite. -- AFP News

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18/05/2005 (SA)  

Helsinki - An exceptionally bright "fireball" was spotted late on Tuesday slicing through the sky over Finland before exploding over the country's border with Russia, the Finnish Astronomical Association (URSA) said on Wednesday.

The phenomenon was witnessed by dozens of people in the eastern part of the country.

"Our mathematicians have roughly calculated that the (fireball) began its decent over our eastern border and ended in an explosion over the Russian Karelia region," URSA newsletter editor Marko Pekkola said.

Closer calculations will be needed to determine the exact route taken by the "fireball", which was probably an incandescent meteorite, Pekkola added.

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Fireball Seen by 8 Persons over La Porte

3/2/1966 

La  Porte, Indiana USA UPI 

Four more persons told police that they saw a strange orange ball with an antenna-like appendages fly low across the sky early Saturday morning. 

This made a total of eight witnesses to the unidentified flying object, including a city policeman and two young motorists who said they were followed by the thing as they drove from Michigan City to La Porte. 

Patrolman Michael Spevak said he saw it as he walk his beat in downtown La Porte during the pre dawn hours. 

One of the motorists said an “orange colored ball” tailed his car and frequently flared into a blinding burst of light, forcing him to stop along the road and wait for it to pass. 

“It has a protruding antenna in the shape of a cross,” he aid.   He said it appeared to sail along at the approximate height of a three story building.

 Spevak described the thing as having the color of a star but without “glistening.  It was sort of whitish, white light with a yellowish tinge.”

 Spevak said he watched it for 13 to 20 minutes as it zigzagged through the sky and disappeared.

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SKY FIREBALLS ORIGIN HUNTED BY SCIENTISTS

4/1955 

Scientists today tried to untangle the mystery of two unidentified but brilliant objects believed to be fireballs which flashed across New Mexico skies.

 Dr. Lincoln La Paz, of the University of New Mexico Institute of Meteoritics, declared that they were "of the same family."  He said he did not think they were ordinary meteorites since it would be "incredible" for two to fall in New Mexico in one day.  He added:

 "We'll find nothing most likely when we try to recover what dropped."

 The two objects, one brilliant green, the other brilliant white, flashed through New Mexico skies at almost the same moment yesterday morning.

 Observers reported they saw "dirt fly into the air" when the white one hit the ground about 30 miles northeast of Lordsburg.  But they reported no sound.  Observers of the green fireball heard nothing either.  Dr. La Paz said meteorites make a tremendous noise.

 "The lines of sight on both make me almost certain these are two distinct objects," Dr. La Paz said.  "But I believe they are of the same family.  I don't know what they are."

 The two objects had in common direct falls rather than a sweeping horizontal passage through the skies.  Neither made any sound.  So far no trace has been discovered of either.

 The green fireball was sighted in Albuquerque and Roswell, and in the Tularosa Basin covering almost all of southeastern and south central New Mexico.  The white one was near Lordsburg, in southwestern New Mexico.

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 June 1, 2005
NewScientist.com news service
David L Chandler

A comet has been added to the list of potentially threatening near-Earth objects maintained by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Comet Catalina 2005 JQ5 is the largest - and therefore most potentially devastating - of the 70 objects now being tracked. However, the chances of a collision are very low.

The listing of Comet Catalina underscores the uncertainty in the knowledge of whether comets or asteroids pose a greater threat to Earth. Previous estimates of the proportion of the impact risk posed by comets have varied widely, from 1% to 50%, with most recent estimates at the lower end.

But comets are larger and faster-moving, on average, so their impacts could be a significant part of the overall risk to human life. And, unlike asteroids, they lie on randomly-oriented and usually highly elongated orbits. This makes them much more likely to remain undiscovered until they are very close to Earth.

Comet Catalina was found by the Catalina Sky Survey, one of the six current, large-scale and automated search programmes for near-Earth asteroids. It was initially designated as an asteroid when first spotted on May 6. But was reclassified as a comet when observers saw characteristic fuzziness in the image, indicating ice and dust streaming off.

Its size is estimated at about 1 kilometre but Steve Chesley of JPL told New Scientist that this "could be off by a factor of a few" in either direction. If there is enough dusty coma to increase its brightness significantly, the nucleus itself might only be a few hundred metres across. But if there is very little dust, then because comets are quite dark, the nucleus could be larger than estimated, perhaps a few kilometres across, Chesley said. "So 1 kilometre is pretty much in the middle of the reasonable range."

Collision course?
On 26 May, JPL's unique orbital calculation software determined that Comet Catalina was on what could possibly be a collision course with Earth, though the odds of such an impact were small: just 1 chance in 300,000 of a strike on June 11, 2085. Based on the 1 kilometre size estimate, that would produce a 6-gigaton impact - equivalent to 6 billion tonnes of TNT.

Astronomers expect the addition of further observations to the calculations to rule out any possibility of a collision, as happens with most newly-seen objects.

But that has not quite happened yet. With an extra week of data, the comet's predicted pathway actually drew even closer to making a perfect bull’s-eye with the Earth - its predicted path passes within 400 kilometres of where the centre of our 12,700-km-diameter planet will be around that time.

However, uncertainty in the exact timing of the comet’s pass through the line of Earth’s orbit dropped the odds of an impact to about 1 in 120 million. That is very low, but the observations so far cannot categorically rule a collision out.

Forceful outgassing
Chesley adds that even the slim 1 in 120 million odds are an overestimate, because comets, unlike asteroids, can move in unpredictable ways because of the forceful outgassing that creates their dusty comas and tails. The odds therefore might be wrong "by a factor of two or so" he said. The cut-off for inclusion on the list is 1 in 10 billion.

The only other comet placed on the JPL list of near-Earth objects with possible collision paths was added in 2003. But additional observations ruled out a possible impact - that comet was removed from the list after less than a week.

Just one other comet, Swift-Tuttle, has been recorded with a non-zero possibility of impact. It was rediscovered in 1992 - after more than a century's absence - before the JPL list was created.

Additional observations during Swift-Tuttle’s passage, thanks to the publicity surrounding the possible impact, made it possible to rule out the possibility of an Earth impact anytime in this millennium. However, Swift-Tuttle is on an orbit that will almost certainly cause it to crash into the Earth or the moon eventually.

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April 26 2005  CDT

WINNIPEG – Local stargazing experts have been fielding dozens of calls from people who spotted a massive meteor in the daytime sky over western Manitoba on Saturday.

Scott Young of the Manitoba Museum's planetarium says calls are coming in "fast and furious" from people who saw or heard the meteor, which passed over Riding Mountain before exploding high over the St. Ambroise area, north of Portage la Prairie.

"About half the people only heard it because of the sonic boom – the explosion – and people were thinking maybe it's a plane crash or something like that. They ran outside and would see this cloud of smoke that was expanding in the upper atmosphere that was visible for tens of minutes," says Young.

"The people who saw it described it as a flaming baseball or a Roman candle with all sorts of flames and trailing smoke arching across the sky and then detonating in a final explosion. Sounds like a spectacular sight."

Young says this type of thing doesn't happen very often.

"We've been trying to find other references to meteors that were bright enough to be seen in the daytime, and there's a handful throughout all recorded history in the Prairies at all. There was one in Manitoba maybe 20 years ago," he says.

"It's a very rare kind of thing. Most of the meteors that we see at night are just little grains of sand, and a really bright one might be the size of a marble. But this was probably the size of a suitcase."

Young hopes more people will contact him to say where they were and what direction they were looking when they saw the space rock hurtling through the sky, so he can pinpoint the exact details of the meteor's path.

"What we need to do is get a bunch of reports, put them all together and that will help us narrow down the search area for looking for pieces," he says. "Almost certainly this event would have produced at least one sizeable chunk of meteorite which would have made it to the ground, and we'd like to find it."

Young can be reached at the planetarium at 956-2830 or by e-mail at skyinfo@manitobamuseum.ca.

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Monday, November 07, 2005/ Daily Times- Pakistan

Numerous sightings of massive fireballs in the skies over Germany this week have led to an upsurge in reports of UFOs, but scientists believe the cause could be a bizarre annual meteor blitz.

According to the Web site of the US National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), such fireballs have been reported elsewhere in the world and may also be due to the fact that the Earth is now orbiting through a swarm of space debris. Many people in Germany have noticed the fireballs, said Werner Walter, an amateur astronomer in Mannheim who runs a Web site on unexplained astronomical phenomena and a hotline for reports on unidentified flying objects (UFO).

“The last reported sighting was yesterday at 7:30 p.m. in a corridor near the border of the Netherlands,” he told Reuters in a telephone interview. “This week we have had at least 15 emails and phone calls from people reporting these fireballs,” he said. “Some people said it looks like something out of a science fiction horror film.”

In addition to a possible meteor streak, Walter said amateur and professional astronomers were considering the possibility that the blitz was the result of a “falling satellite or UFOs.”

“It is possible that they are UFOs, which are after all things which we cannot explain,” he said. NASA’s science Web site (http://science.nasa.gov) mentions reports of recent fireball sightings in the United States, Canada, the Netherlands, North Ireland and Japan. It includes images of the fireballs, which one man likened to a spotlight. Walter described them as “super-large, coloured fireballs that shoot with the speed of lightning through the sky”.

However, the NASA Web site quotes meteor expert David Asher from the Armagh Observatory in Northern Ireland as saying that people “are probably seeing the Taurid meteor shower”.

Taurids are meteors that shoot out of the constellation Taurus, which peaks at the end of October and early November. reuters

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Lakeway, Texas  USA

8/1/2006

A fireball seen streaking through the sky in Lakeway, Texas, "turned night to day," according to a police officer who witnessed the event.

--

A police cruiser dashcam videotaped the streak at about 11 p.m. Wednesday.
Hundreds of residents who witnessed the bright light in the sky called police and media, KNBC-TV reported.

"A police officer who captured the video said the light turned night into day," Local 6's Jacqueline London said.

Astronomers said the light was either a meteor fireball or space junk entering the atmosphere, according to the report.
 

 Local 6 News

February 05, 2007

Source: Startribune.com Associated Press

From southeastern Wisconsin to as far as Des Moines, Iowa and St. Louis, people reported seeing balls of fire, possibly meteors, streaking across the sky Sunday night.


MILWAUKEE — From southeastern Wisconsin to as far as Des Moines, Iowa and St. Louis, people reported seeing balls of fire, possibly meteors, streaking across the sky last night.
No major meteor showers were expected in the northern hemisphere on Sunday night, said Jim Lattis, director of the University of Wisconsin-Madison astronomy department's Space Place. But he said it was possible that a minor shower may have been what prompted calls to authorities.

The National Weather Service's Sullivan office said reports were called in from Iowa, northern Illinois and on up to Green Bay.

Dozens of people throughout the St. Louis region and Illinois reported small objects that looked like bright lights or something burning, with flaming tails behind some of them, said Ken Tretter, with the Missouri State Highway Patrol in St. Louis.

In Wisconsin, a Waukesha County dispatch supervisor said two callers reported a sighting around 8:15 p.m.

The Winnebago County Sheriff's Department said it received calls from Oshkosh, Ripon, Appleton, Neenah, and Pulaski, among others.

A preliminary report Sunday indicated that the lights were from a meteor, said Maj. April Cunningham, a spokeswoman for North American Aerospace Defense Command, or NORAD, which watches for airborne threats to the United States and Canada.

"We had a pilot reporting seeing a meteor and that's really all the information we have tonight," Cunningham said

 

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source: stltoday.com

Scores of people all over the central United States reported seeing flames and fiery explosions in the sky Sunday night.

Calls flooded 911 operators and area police departments, the Missouri Highway Patrol said. Callers described the spectacle in various ways, some saying it looked like a plane crash and others calling it a ball of fire in the sky.

A preliminary report Sunday indicated that the lights were from a meteor, said Maj. April Cunningham, a spokeswoman for North American Aerospace Defense Command, or NORAD, which watches for airborne threats to the United States and Canada.

"We had a pilot reporting seeing a meteor, and that's really all the information we have tonight," Cunningham said.

Reports came from residents in central Missouri, Illinois, Kansas, Wisconsin and Minnesota, the Highway Patrol said.

The patrol forwarded the information to the Federal Aviation Administration and had no reports of damage or landings from the potential meteor or space debris.


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FIERY UFO BLOWS UP OFF N.J. - USA
September 2, 2007
By PHILIP MESSING and HASANI GITTENS   New York Post

 -- Head for the hills! A mysterious giant "fireball" was spotted exploding over the ocean off the Jersey Shore last night, but officials had no idea last night what it was.

The unidentified falling object was first seen at about 8:40 p.m. by people on Normandy Beach in Ocean County, and was also spotted as far away as Fire Island and South Carolina, officials said.

"It was dispatched as a fireball, out over the ocean, going into the ocean," Deputy Chief Tim Cook of the Toms River, N.J., Fire Department told The Post.

At least 15 witnesses on the beach all described the same thing, he said.

"It was a large fireball that came down and sort of dropped down into the ocean."

Coast Guard cutters and helicopters were dispatched, but found nothing, said Coast Guard spokesman Petty Officer Nyx Cangemi.

"It's a real mystery," he added.

The FAA also had no idea what it was.

"We have no planes reported missing," said agency spokesman Jim Peters who said he checked with area airports and nearby McGuire Air Force Base.

Some officials speculated that it may have been a comet or a meteor, but a spokeswoman with the New Jersey Astrological Association said, "It's news to us."

The rare Aurigid meteor shower - which produces blue and green lights - was expected to take place last night, and may have been to blame.

philip.messing@nypost.com


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Hunt, but No "Fireball" Off New Jersey
September 2, 2007

New York Times

The frantic calls started coming in around 8 p.m., from New York City all the way south to South Carolina: fireballs from the sky. Burning boats. Flares. Strobe lights on the water.

The United States Coast Guard, along with Dover Township fire and rescue workers and commercial salvage ships, sent out boats off Normandy Beach in New Jersey.

After several hours, the investigators found no sign of distress, no debris. The Federal Aviation Administration said it was not missing any commercial aircraft. There were no distress beacons or mayday calls, the authorities said. So at 11 p.m., the Coast Guard called off the search.

The possible origins of the lights became clearer from a warmer, dryer locale: a computer.

“Type in ‘rare,’ ‘meteor’ and ‘National Geographic’ into Google,” Nyx Cangemi, a spokesman for the Coast Guard, suggested.

The top hit was about a rare meteor shower, the Aurigid Meteor Shower, that was expected to be visible yesterday.

It may have taken the East Coast by surprise, however, because astronomers had predicted that the meteor shower would appear only on the West Coast.

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Residents West of Edmonton Believe Giant Golf Course Hole Created by Meteor

THE CANADIAN PRESS
21/01/08

SPRUCE GROVE, Alta. — The mystery of what Spruce Grove residents believe was a meteorite began to unravel Sunday after an eyewitness came forward to say he’d seen a fireball shoot down from the sky.
“I first thought it was a shooting star, but it wasn’t burning out,” said Eric Whyte, who was driving southbound on Highway 2 between St. Albert and Morinville around 10 p.m. Thursday.
“It was a big ball of fire, bright orangey in colour and there was a big tail behind it.”
Astronomer Martin Beech said the sighting of a fireball is crucial in determining whether it was a meteorite. But he couldn’t say for sure what dropped into the frozen pond at The Links at Spruce Grove, just west of Edmonton.
Derrick Zienowicz was the first one to see the strange octopus-shaped hole in the frozen golf-course pond Saturday morning.
He immediately told his neighbours Tina Danyluk and James Shankowski, whose house is closest to the strange marks.
They initially believed the strange marks were made late Friday night or early Saturday.
But both Shankowski and Zienowicz said it’s possible the marks have been there since Thursday night because none of them looked out their back windows Friday.
About 10 p.m. Thursday, Zienowicz said he felt his house shake while he was standing in the kitchen.
"It’s kinda weird. For about 10 seconds, the house shook. I said, ’What the heck was that?’"
He now suspects it was associated with the fireball and the strange marks.
A bright burning ball with an associated sonic boom normally indicates a falling meteor, said Beech, who teaches astronomy at Campion College in the University of Regina.
(Edmonton Sun)


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Man Spots Fireball Debate Over Whether It Was a Shooting Star or Meteorite 


By RENATO GANDIA, SUN MEDIA
Mon, January 21, 2008

By RENATO GANDIA, SUN MEDIA

The mystery surrounding what Spruce Grove residents believe was a meteorite that hit an area pond last week began to unravel yesterday.


An eyewitness came forward to say he had seen a fireball shoot down from the sky.

"I first thought it was a shooting star, but it wasn't burning out," said Eric Whyte, who was driving southbound on Highway 2 between St. Albert and Morinville around 10 p.m. Thursday.

"It was a big ball of fire, bright orangey in colour, and there was a big tail behind it," he recalled.


Astronomer Martin Beech said the sighting of a fireball is crucial in determining whether it was a meteorite.

But he couldn't say for sure what dropped into the frozen pond at The Links golf course in Spruce Grove, just west of Edmonton.

Derrick Zienowicz was the first to see the strange octopus-shaped hole in the frozen pond on Saturday morning.

He immediately told his neighbours Tina Danyluk and James Shankowski, whose house is closest to the

strange marks.

They initially believed the strange marks were made late Friday night or early Saturday.

But both Shankowski and Zienowicz said it is possible the marks had been there since Thursday night because none of them looked out their back windows Friday.

Also, Zienowicz said he felt his house shake at about 10 p.m. Thursday while he was standing in the kitchen.

"It's kinda weird. For about 10 seconds, the house shook. I said, 'What the heck was that?' "

He now suspects it was associated with the fireball and the strange marks.

A bright burning ball with an associated sonic boom normally indicates a falling meteor, said Beech, who teaches astronomy at Campion College at the University of Regina.

But Whyte said none of his family believed he saw a falling meteor.

"They were all saying it's a shooting star and they thought I was crazy. I read the article in the Sun (yesterday about the pond) and then it made perfect sense."


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Fireball Over Polk County

08 Feb 2008, 6:00 PM EST

  
DAVENPORT - A mysterious fireball that raced across the night sky in Polk County has people wondering, "What in the world was it?"

Rhett Marcatos was sitting on his porch in Davenport, when something caught his eye. An unidentified flying object that appeared to be engulfed in flames was shooting towards the horizon.

"I didn't know what to do. Take the kids inside, or let them see it. So, I hollered to my wife to come outside. After two to three minutes of watching it, she thought to grab the camcorder," Marcatos told FOX 13.

Soon, the whole neighborhood was outside looking up in amazement.

"I didn't want it to land anywhere near where I was. That's forever lovin' sure," said Rhett's mom, Dorothy Marcatos.

Minutes later, they saw a second baffling sight. Another unidentified streak, much lighter than the first, moving across the sky far in the distance.

The unexplained phenomena caught the attention of a lot of other people too. Dozens of 911 calls came into the Polk County Sheriff's Office.
When video of the fireball showed up on "You Tube," the internet began buzzing about it. Everyone was wondering what could it be.

"When I got to work the next day, I showed people the video. Within minutes, they said, 'You got aliens. That's a UFO,'" Marcatos said. "I had one gentleman say 'That started the fires on I-4,' because the very next day the I-4 accident happened."

A spokesman for the Kennedy Space Center says it might have been space trash falling to earth.

The astrophysicist who runs the planetarium at Florida Southern College in Lakeland disagrees. Dr. Mossayeb Jamshid says objects from outer space fall quicker. It took at least 10 minutes for the fireball to disappear. Jamshid says it may have been a jet that looked like it was on fire because an optical illusion of the sunset hitting its contrail.  (Comment:  This is not a reflection from the sun onto a jet.  (RB)

Whatever it was, Marcatos is now convinced that the unexpected can happen anytime, anywhere.

"I look up. I look up a lot," he said.

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High Desert Sky Watchers See Exploding Fireball

February 19, 2008 

Wash. pilot says he saw meteorite hit ground

By Barney Lerten and Victoria Adelus, KTVZ.COM, with AP and KTVZ.COM news sources

A meteor was seen streaking across the early-morning sky Tuesday - and even bursting into pieces - across a wide area of the Pacific Northwest, from Idaho and Central Oregon to the Portland area and Washington state to British Columbia - even Montana.

A Federal Aviation Administration duty officer in Seattle confirmed that the streaking light in the sky was a meteor. It was described by many as a "large fireball" and was spotted in Vancouver and Portland around 5:30 a.m., as well as areas as far away as Boise.

A Horizon Air pilot reported he thought the meteorite hit the ground with a flash and burst of light in Adams County, about 90 miles southwest of Spokane, about 5:45 a..m., said FAA spokesman Mike Fergus in Seattle.

Numerous Central Oregon residents - and reportedly, the FAA tower at Redmond Airport- called Deschutes County 911 to report seeing the fireball, a dispatcher said.

"It was just amazing - like something you'd see out of the movies," a caller told a 911 dispatcher in recordings obtained by NewsChannel 21.

At least one 911 caller surmised it was the planned shootdown of a faltering spy satellite, but apparently that's not it.

Bob Grossfeld, manager of the Sunriver Nature Center Observatory, said "it appears to be a meteorite of some type," having checked to find no "space junk" re-entering the atmosphere."

Rick Hickmann, who lives in northeast Bend, was riding his bike to work at Mountain View High, where he's head custodian, when he "saw this explode" while riding near Hamby and Butler Market roads.

"It was awesome!" he said by e-mail. "It really lit up the northeast portion of the sky when it exploded."

"After the explosion, the large part went straight down, with smaller pieces going above and to the north side," Hickmann added.

Robert M. Williams, a semi truck driver for Pepsi, was heading northeast on Eighth Street in Bend when he "saw a very VERY bright long flash."

"I would describe it as a huge falling star, only much, much closer," Williams said by e-mail. "It seemed white to me, the same color as a falling star. It was very bright and the first time I have witnessed anything like that."

Northeast Bend resident John Watts said he'd left home for his morning run.

"I started heading west and had run only a few steps when there was a bright flash behind me, to my east," Watts wrote. "It was so bright, my first thought was that it was a flash of lightning. It lit the sky night sky and for a second it was bright as day. It didn't last more than a second or two."

"By the time I could turn around and try to figure out what was going on, it was over."

A Redmond woman called to say she saw the "beautiful" flash in the sky at the north Y, by the Towne Pump. "I was scared it was a plane," she said.

A Prineville resident, "Faye," told KTVZ.COM readers, "I was working early this morning and saw a flash very similar to a long lightning flash that lit up the sky outside my window. I thought at first it was lightning or a transformer blowing somewhere."

A resident on Bend's north side who asked not to be named said he saw a blue-green flash for about a half-second that went down toward the northeast. He heard no sound, and said it looked somewhat similar to a firework.

A half-hour later, the man's daughter, who lives in Boise, called to say she saw it as well.

A number of pilots reported seeing the meteor streaking through the sky, an FAA duty officer said. TV stations in Spokane got viewer calls from a wide swath, from northern Idaho and southeastern British Columbia to across Washington state and parts of Oregon.

Some said it resembled summer lightning, a rocket, a satellite or an exploding transformer. Others, including a woman in Walla Walla, actually reported hearing a sonic boom and said it rattled their windows. The woman said she also felt a shock wave moments later.

"This fireball was moving from the west to east," said OMSI Planetarium Manager Jim Todd. "When a solid object enters the Earth's atmosphere, it interacts with air molecules, heats up to over 2000 degrees Fahrenheit, and begins to glow. The incandescent object is called a meteor."

He went on to explain that when meteor is brighter than the planet Venus, it is called a fireball.

"A bright fireball will produce meteorites on the ground. A fast fireball can last for a few seconds and even break up into pieces," Todd added.

A Plains, Mont., resident wrote to KTVZ.COM, saying he "saw a red fireball off to the west that exploded into a very bright light, like lightning."

Experts will be tracking Tuesday's many eyewitness reports and attempting to pinpoint the locations of possible meteorites on the ground, so samples can be recovered.

Stanley Jenkins said he was heading east on Washington state Highway 24 when "the sky overhead turned bright white, not blue green" as others claimed.

"I never saw the meteor until it came into view in my windshield," Jenkins wrote. "When it became visible it was streaking at approximately a 45-degree angle and went from a bright white line or ball to bright red and then collided" with the ground, all in perhaps "less than two seconds."

The widespread sightings brought to mind a fireball seen last Christmas Eve by numerous residents across Central Oregon, Northern California and Nevada.

Another similar event happened back in 2005 over the Northwest. A fireball was spotted streaking through the sky on the 15th of March. That meteor was likely about the size of a basketball and likely landed in the Pacific Ocean, experts said.


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Witnesses: Fireball in the sky

By MARTIN J. KIDSTON - Independent Record - 02/20/08

A streak of light and a brilliant flash on the western horizon Tuesday morning caught the attention of early risers living across a wide swath of the Pacific Northwest, including much of Montana.

Residents from Judith Gap in central Montana to Spokane, Wash., reported seeing a fireball race across the predawn sky at around 6:40 a.m., followed by a brilliant glow beyond the horizon, leading some to believe the object had impacted nearby.

Matthew Weber, one morning commuter in Helena, reported seeing a large green meteor streak down, resulting in an orange flash that lit up the horizon. From his perspective, the object appeared to hit beyond the “near mountains to the west.”

Another commuter, Kip Davis, believed the object landed near Birdseye. She too saw the pre-dawn sky come alive with a flash of intense color.

“I was heading in on the interstate — heading into town,” said Davis, who lives in the North Hills. “I looked over my right shoulder. It was coming down. It was huge. It went from amber to a bright, brilliant green.”

Early in the day, The Associated Press picked up a story from the Spokesman Review in Spokane, which reported that a pilot with Horizon Air Lines had seen the meteor crash into Earth near State Route 26, some 30 miles southwest of the city.
However, law enforcement officials in Washington said they hadn’t received any reports of a meteor actually hitting the ground. Some in Seattle reported seeing the object as well, raising the question: Where did it actually land?

“The fact that there have been reports that it seemed to impact is unusual in itself,” said William Hiscock, head of the Department of Physics at Montana State University in Bozeman. “That makes this a noteworthy event. But it’s very hard to judge something in the sky in terms of how high it is, how fast it’s going, and how big it is. It may have still been 30 miles up. You just can’t tell with a naked eye.”

Historically, Hiscock said, only a handful of meteorites have ever been found in Montana. Most of those discovered on Earth after impact are collected in Antarctica, where the snow and ice makes recovery easier.

Space dust and small meteors colliding with Earth may not be that uncommon, Hiscock said. In contrast, large meteor impacts are predicted to occur only once every 100 years.

In northern Siberia in 1908, the air burst from one such impact caused an explosion that felled 80 million trees over 830 square miles. The phenomenon had an estimated magnitude similar to a 5.0 earthquake.

“The number of meteors that hit the Earth every year isn’t well understood,” Hiscock said. “From what little I’ve heard, what happened this morning could have been a meteorite or a piece of so-called space junk reentering the atmosphere. Given that it was so bright and so many people saw it, I would lean toward meteor.”

One local witness called 911, fearing that an airplane had gone down. Some wondered if the meteor was somehow related to tonight’s lunar eclipse. Others speculated that perhaps the U.S. military had shot down the Pentagon’s crippled spy satellite earlier than planned.

“That would definitely be a not,” said 2nd Lt. Korry Leverett, public affairs officer with the 341st Space Wing at Malmstrom Air Force Base.

As for tracking the object, Leverett added, “We don’t have any way of tracking or knowing what that would have been. We don’t have any planes around here anymore, so we don’t have any radar.”

Lewis and Clark County Sheriff Cheryl Liedle said her department responded to dozens of calls Tuesday morning.

The department investigated each call, fearing that perhaps an airplane had crashed somewhere west of Helena in the rugged mountain terrain.

“We were running all over the place, trying to find out what fell out of the sky,” she said.

Reporter Martin Kidston: 447-4086 or mkidston@helenair.com
--------------------------------

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Meteor Crashes Into School Field

Tuesday March 04 2008

Ever thought what you'd do if one day something came hurtling out of the sky towards you?
Well that's what happened to kids at Yardley School in Birmingham. They were having a normal PE lesson when something came crashing out of the sky.

The thing was bigger than a shoebox and shattered into several large chunks when it hit the ground, leaving a hole.

Lizo went to find out more about the "meteor" ice, which was reddish in colour and didn't smell of anything.

Some of the kids said it narrowly missed them as it fell.

It's thought to be a megacryo-meteor, which is the name given to large chunks of ice which fall from the sky.

But chunks of it are being stored in a freezer at a research lab so more tests can be carried out.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/cbbcnews/hi/newsid_7270000/newsid_7275800/7275899.stm

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Mysterious Fireball Lights Up New Mexico Night Sky

Observatory Captures Video Of Flashing Light

POSTED: 10:44 am PDT May 13, 2008

A mysterious flash of lights over New Mexico's Sandia Crest early Monday morning had some residents wondering if they had seen an unidentified flying object.

But experts said the bright spot, spotted just after 2 a.m., was most likely a meteor.

Video of the flashing light was captured by an observatory near Santa Fe.

According to a University of New Mexico scientist, it was most likely a meteor passing through the earth's atmosphere.

It's a rare sight for anyone to witness, but the real treasure is finding the meteorite once it lands.

"It would be worth something scientifically, for sure, and you know everybody is interested in finding meteorites that come from this fireball event," said UNM research scientist James Karner.

Karner said the dry deserts of New Mexico make it easier to spot meteorites on the ground.

Thomas Ashcraft, the man who captured the video from his observatory, said the space rock probably landed in eastern New Mexico or the Texas panhandle.

Video Link  http://www.knbc.com/news/16253799/detail.html

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Mystery Fireball Seen Streaking Across Sky in Southern California

July 3, 2008
www.chinaview.cn

LOS ANGELES, July 2 (Xinhua) -- A mystery fireball was seen streaking across the sky over Southern California, The Los Angeles Times reported on Wednesday.

Witnesses across Southern California said they saw an object moving very fast across the northern sky and falling near the San Bernardino Mountains near Los Angeles.

San Bernardino County Fire Dispatch reported receiving dozens of calls related to a fireball moving at high speed in the northwest sky around 10:40 a.m. local time on Tuesday.

"We got quite a few reports. It started with a gentlemen in the Lake Arrowhead area reporting a fireball in the Meadow Bay area, and then we started getting calls from all over," San Bernardino County dispatch supervisor Tom Barnes said.

"Fire crews in Barstow and on I-15 near Stateline came up on the radio and reported an object in the sky moving very fast across the northern sky and described it as yellowish green in color with streaks of debris. It looked like it burned up before it hit the ground."

Barnes said the department has "basically determined it was most likely not an aircraft and was probably man-made or a meteor entering the Earth's atmosphere."

Meteors are small rocky fragments of other planetary bodies that fall toward Earth. Meteorites are what strikes the ground. Asteroids are larger meteors.

A fireball is one of a common class of meteor, denoting a bright, streaming orb. Fireballs decelerate from 60,000 mph to 200mph during their journeys, often burning up before they fall to Earth.

Studies have indicated that about 25 meteorites weighing more than a fifth of a pound fall on an area the size of California annually. Experts say about 300 to 400 larger meteorites fell on California during the last century.

"Events like this do happen around the world. But a bright meteor is not something people would usually recognize in the day," said Lance Benner, a research scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Passadena of Los Angeles. "The eyewitness account suggests it was a small asteroid hitting the atmosphere."


Editor: Yan Liang

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Mystery Fireball Streaks Across Sky

Witnesses across Southern California say they saw an object 'moving very fast across the northern sky' and falling near the San Bernardino Mountains. Officials have no firm answers on what it was.
By Richard Winton, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
July 2, 2008
From the Hollywood Hills to the Nevada state line, people reported seeing a fireball streaking across the sky and appearing to fall toward the San Bernardino Mountains on Tuesday morning. But explanations of the mysterious object were scarce.

San Bernardino County Fire Dispatch reported receiving dozens of calls related to a fireball moving at high speed in the northwest sky around 10:40 a.m.



Did you see the SoCal fireball?
"We got quite a few reports. It started with a gentlemen in the Lake Arrowhead area reporting a fireball in the Meadow Bay area, and then we started getting calls from all over," said San Bernardino County dispatch supervisor Tom Barnes.

"Fire crews in Barstow and on I-15 near Stateline came up on the radio and reported an object in the sky moving very fast across the northern sky and described it as yellowish green in color with streaks of debris. It looked like it burned up before it hit the ground."

Barnes said the department has "basically determined it was most likely not an aircraft and was probably man-made or a meteor entering the Earth's atmosphere."

Meteors are small rocky fragments of other planetary bodies that fall toward Earth. Meteorites are what strikes the ground. Asteroids are larger meteors.

A fireball is one of a common class of meteor, denoting a bright, streaming orb. Fireballs decelerate from 60,000 mph to 200 mph during their journeys, often burning up before they fall to Earth.

Studies have indicated that about 25 meteorites weighing more than a fifth of a pound fall on an area the size of California annually. Caltech experts say about 300 to 400 larger meteorites fell on California during the last century.

"Events like this do happen around the world. But a bright meteor is not something people would usually recognize in the day," said Lance Benner, a research scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in La Cañada Flintridge. "The eyewitness account suggests it was a small asteroid hitting the atmosphere."

The fact that it was spotted in daylight suggests it could have been farther away than it appeared, Benner said. He said it could have landed several hundred miles away.

Benner said he knows of a case in which a fireball seen in Pennsylvania ended up landing in New York state in 1992.

Benner said it was unlikely any radar system picked it up.

However, it may have been caught by security cameras at gas stations or other outdoor facilities whose vantage point has the sky as backdrop, he said.

John Haire, chief of media relations for Edwards Air Force Base, said the base had no test flights at the time of the sightings.

"I think some people have been watching too much 'X-Files,' " he said, referring to the popular show about FBI agents investigating phenomena with no conventional explanation.

Most of the reports came from Riverside and San Bernardino counties, but a few people said they saw the fireball as far west as the Hollywood Hills.

Federal Aviation Administration spokesman Ian Gregor said the FAA received no reports of any missing or downed aircraft and the military had not informed the agency of any problems with aircraft or missiles.

The Barstow Fire Protection District dispatched firefighters near the town of Calico, but found no evidence of a meteorite or anything else hitting the ground, officials said.

Rimoftheworld.net, which covers the San Bernardino Mountains area, reported overhearing a fire attack plane relaying that it had detected an emergency beacon near Butler Peak in the Big Bear area.

But no signs of a downed aircraft were found.

richard.winton@latimes.com

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Fireball In Sky Not A Plane, Halifax police say

Last Updated: Thursday, July 3, 2008 CBC News

Police investigating a report of a small plane crashing in Halifax say the glowing object was likely a flare.

A group of children reported that a fireball nosedived to the ground in a wooded area off Herring Cove Road Wednesday evening.

Firefighters, police and search-and-rescue teams sprang into action. As a helicopter searched from above, police rode dirt bikes through the woods.

But as the investigation continued, it was appearing less likely that the object was a plane.

Police said they were told that someone had fired a flare nearby, which matched the trajectory of the object the children saw.

The helicopter didn't find wreckage, no airports had light planes in the air at the time, and no one else reported seeing a plane go down, police said.

The search was called off shortly after dark.
----

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Fireball Remains a Mystery

July 2, 2008


There is still no explanation of the fireball that soared through Southern California skies yesterday morning at about 10:40 a.m. "I was in downtown Los Angeles on the 31st floor of my office and just happened to look out the window to see a bright white streak disappear behind the the San Gabriel Mountains. It was over in an instant. It was huge, at least as wide as the moon, but it had a tail," wrote Brian Bartholomew in an LA Times comments section.

Most reports of witnessing the fireball came from within Riverside and San Bernardino counties. Even "fire crews in Barstow and on I-15 near Stateline reported seeing an object in the sky moving very fast across the northern sky and described it as yellowish green in color with streaks of debris. It looked like it burned up before it hit the ground," according to an LA Times report.

Some thought it may have been an aircraft, but the FAA claims they have no missing planes on record. Rimoftheworld.net archived the radio calls between some agencies and reports that "some experts believe it was space junk burning up as it entered the Earth's atmosphere."


"The eyewitness account suggests it was a small asteroid hitting the atmosphere," Lance Benner of NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab said to the Times. 25 or so meteorites are said to fall onto California annually.

The American Meteor Society tracks witness sightings of fireballs, the majority of which are reported to be seen at night. According to their table database, there were various Los Angeles area reports of them near midnight on June 14. On June 17, a slew of more sightings were documented. Various commenters on LAist explained witnessing a fireball within the past few weeks, but saw no news reports on it.

Some might suggest a conspiracy theory, aliens (didn't they come through lightening bolts in Spielberg's 'War of the Worlds'?) or even a Sam Zell "inventive" marketing ploy for the movie, Hancock.


-----

Mystery fireball streaks across sky

Witnesses across Southern California say they saw an object 'moving very fast across the northern sky' and falling near the San Bernardino Mountains. Officials have no firm answers on what it was.
By Richard Winton, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
July 2, 2008
From the Hollywood Hills to the Nevada state line, people reported seeing a fireball streaking across the sky and appearing to fall toward the San Bernardino Mountains on Tuesday morning. But explanations of the mysterious object were scarce.

San Bernardino County Fire Dispatch reported receiving dozens of calls related to a fireball moving at high speed in the northwest sky around 10:40 a.m.



Did you see the SoCal fireball?
"We got quite a few reports. It started with a gentlemen in the Lake Arrowhead area reporting a fireball in the Meadow Bay area, and then we started getting calls from all over," said San Bernardino County dispatch supervisor Tom Barnes.

"Fire crews in Barstow and on I-15 near Stateline came up on the radio and reported an object in the sky moving very fast across the northern sky and described it as yellowish green in color with streaks of debris. It looked like it burned up before it hit the ground."

Barnes said the department has "basically determined it was most likely not an aircraft and was probably man-made or a meteor entering the Earth's atmosphere."


Meteors are small rocky fragments of other planetary bodies that fall toward Earth. Meteorites are what strikes the ground. Asteroids are larger meteors.

A fireball is one of a common class of meteor, denoting a bright, streaming orb. Fireballs decelerate from 60,000 mph to 200 mph during their journeys, often burning up before they fall to Earth.

Studies have indicated that about 25 meteorites weighing more than a fifth of a pound fall on an area the size of California annually. Caltech experts say about 300 to 400 larger meteorites fell on California during the last century.

"Events like this do happen around the world. But a bright meteor is not something people would usually recognize in the day," said Lance Benner, a research scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in La Cañada Flintridge. "The eyewitness account suggests it was a small asteroid hitting the atmosphere."

The fact that it was spotted in daylight suggests it could have been farther away than it appeared, Benner said. He said it could have landed several hundred miles away.

Benner said he knows of a case in which a fireball seen in Pennsylvania ended up landing in New York state in 1992.

Benner said it was unlikely any radar system picked it up.

However, it may have been caught by security cameras at gas stations or other outdoor facilities whose vantage point has the sky as backdrop, he said.

John Haire, chief of media relations for Edwards Air Force Base, said the base had no test flights at the time of the sightings.

"I think some people have been watching too much 'X-Files,' " he said, referring to the popular show about FBI agents investigating phenomena with no conventional explanation.

Most of the reports came from Riverside and San Bernardino counties, but a few people said they saw the fireball as far west as the Hollywood Hills.

Federal Aviation Administration spokesman Ian Gregor said the FAA received no reports of any missing or downed aircraft and the military had not informed the agency of any problems with aircraft or missiles.

The Barstow Fire Protection District dispatched firefighters near the town of Calico, but found no evidence of a meteorite or anything else hitting the ground, officials said.

Rimoftheworld.net, which covers the San Bernardino Mountains area, reported overhearing a fire attack plane relaying that it had detected an emergency beacon near Butler Peak in the Big Bear area.

But no signs of a downed aircraft were found.

richard.winton@latimes.com

---


Mountain Top Incident" - map is near Butler Peak - 2N13 at Butler Peak Road

01:21 PM
Tue 7/1 LA Times - http://tinyurl.com/6cu7nk12:55 PM
Tue 7/1From: Note regarding "ELT"
"The ELT (Emergency Locator Transmitter) is designed to emit an Emergency signal on 121.5MHz. and 243.0MHz. automatically on impact by the use of a "G" switch or by manual activation. With ELT’s, Search and Rescue teams may more easily pinpoint the exact location of downed Aircraft. ELT’s are now also enhanced by Satellite detection."12:31 PM
Tue 7/1 SB Sun: http://www.sbsun.com/ci_9754544 ~~ http://www.sbsun.com/ci_9754655 ~~ http://www.sbsun.com/ci_9754807 ~~ http://www.sbsun.com/ci_975414312:29 PM
Tue 7/1 PE: http://tinyurl.com/4f4jcc12:28 PM
Tue 7/1 VV Daily Press ~ http://tinyurl.com/4kuk7h12:27 PM
Tue 7/1From: AA12
To :To Dispatch 171.4750 AA12 on the ground at San Bernardino12:24 PM
Tue 7/1From: aa12
To :To Dispatch In pattern for landing at San Bernardino, 1 minute eta.12:17 PM
Tue 7/1From: AA12
To :To Dispatch 171.4750 currently over Running Springs, in bound to San Bernardino12:17 PM
Tue 7/1From: AA12
To :To Dispatch 171.4750 we've done a pretty good grid out here by Butler Peak; still getting a good signal out there; unable to locate anything at this time12:13 PM
Tue 7/1From: Patrol 11
To :AA12 ELT could be coming from Squint's Ranch near Arrowhead Airport; {AA12} hard to tell where it was coming from; some activity near Squint's Ranch; unable to locate anything yet except the signal; {Patrol 11} you're aware that Squint's Ranch is active; {AA12} we didn't see any activity on Squint's Ranch landing strip; we're picking it up on ELT transmission on 121.5; {Dispatch 171.4750} FAA has no information on that ELT or the source of the flames that have been seen12:13 PM
Tue 7/1From: Dispatch
To :AA 12 The FAA has no information on that transmission12:04 PM
Tue 7/1From: ANF Air
picking up the signal around Butler Peak, sometimes it comes in strong other times we have to adjust to squelch to pick it up. [response] We haven't seen anything here.12:04 PM
Tue 7/1 Do you think it's on the ridgeline here, or do you think it's on the desert rim?12:03 PM
Tue 7/1From: AA12
To :Resource 41 we're picking up that ELT signal here; was it between you and the desert here or that next ridgeline? {broken scratchy transmissions on 170.000 Air to Ground}12:01 PM
Tue 7/1 We are definitely getting a hit on that signal.12:00 PM
Tue 7/1From: 12L1
To :To Dispatch 171.4750 might want to advise Sheriff's Aviation; {reply} they sent a response about 45 minutes ago and have already cleared12:00 PM
Tue 7/1 per Big Bear Airport, that's negative; we're checking with FAA now on that request; they haven't gotten anything like that today; north and west of Butler Peak {dispatch} we have a report of this sighted at the Apple Valley Quarry also11:58 AM
Tue 7/1From: AA12
To :To Dispatch 171.4750 we're northeast of Butler Peak; contact Big Bear Airport and have them check for any 121.5 emergency locator transmission signals; we're picking up an ELT transmission while searching the area, and we need to make sure Big Bear doesn't have one on11:55 AM
Tue 7/1From: AA12
To :Butler Peak Butler Peak - I'm just north of your tower; did you see anything? {transcriber could not hear reply}11:50 AM
Tue 7/1 {AA12} we're currently over Holcomb Valley 2 mi east of Butler Peak; any area to check specifically where it may have come down; {Bat12 reply} negative, sounded like it came down along the desert rim; {AA12} we haven't seen anything yet, heading west, we'll be heading back to SB Base soon11:46 AM
Tue 7/1From: AA12
To :To Dispatch 171.4750 over Heartbreak Ridge; heading towards Gold Mountain and Holcomb Valley11:36 AM
Tue 7/1From: AA12
To :To Dispatch 171.4750 northeast of Rattlesnake Mountain, 1 mile11:28 AM
Tue 7/1From: 40K
To :To Dispatch We're gonna stay here over the Santa Ana River drainage; enroute back to base to pick up passenger. We are UTL anything in the desert or here in the mountains.11:27 AM
Tue 7/1From: 40K
To :AA12 169.1500 - {scratchy/broken} We didn't see anything out towards the desert; we'll stay on this frequency another 10 minutes 11:23 AM
Tue 7/1From: AA12
To :To Dispatch 171.4750 position check - over north shore of Lake Silverwood11:23 AM
Tue 7/1From: E11
We have checked North side of Arrowhead, Pinnacles. UTL.11:23 AM
Tue 7/1 We've completed our sweep around Lake Arrowhead and Heaps Peak and have nothing showing.11:23 AM
Tue 7/1 Arrowhead, to spillway, to deepcreek to [] and I am UTL.11:23 AM
Tue 7/1From: 12E9
To :To Dispatch 171.4750 we have found nothing specific; en route to Mill Creek (back to previous call?)11:22 AM
Tue 7/1From: 40K
To :To Dispatch Over the Mitsubishi Plant now and UTL.11:21 AM
Tue 7/1From: Div1
To :To Dispatch 171.4750 have AA12 complete his recon11:21 AM
Tue 7/1From: Dispatch 171.4750
To :Div1 40K has completed their search; no smokes anywhere; Desert Comm is canceling their respone11:21 AM
Tue 7/1From: AA 12
We're just coming around Cajon Mt. at this time11:18 AM
Tue 7/1From: Dispatch
To :AA12 Confirming multiple reports across the mountaintop, with various landing points, the most common being the Lucerne Valley area, or near the Pinnacles. So far UTL from the ground.11:17 AM
Tue 7/1From: AA12
To :To Dispatch 171.4750 detail of description of what was seen? {reply} RP in Lake Arrowhead reported it as a flare, multiple reports of it, numerous landing sites; most common being Lucerne; also some in the {} area11:15 AM
Tue 7/1From: AA12
To :To Dispatch 171.4750 heading toward Cajon Pass Lake Silverwood area; one pilot two passengers, will pick up the search from Lake Silverwood; 40K1 coming up on air to air on 169.15011:14 AM
Tue 7/1From: 40K
To :SO Control from Rialto through Arrowhead through Big Bear to the Mitsubishi Plant; no fires11:12 AM
Tue 7/1 Bear City units are available at this time; assuming it is not in their district. E291A has checked the desert floor from a vantage point near Johnson Grade and reports they are UTL.11:08 AM
Tue 7/1From: E11
To :To Dispatch 171.4750 going to check Arbon area near Matterhorn11:08 AM
Tue 7/1From: E14
To :To Dispatch 171.4750 we have a good vantage point of Pinnacles area; nothing showing continue to Arrowhead Lake Road to check that area also11:07 AM
Tue 7/1 AA12 to do a recon of entire mountaintop11:07 AM
Tue 7/1 We're at a good vantage point to see the back side of that hill. So far, we see no smoke showing11:07 AM
Tue 7/1From: E11
To :To Dispatch 171.4750 also check Arrowhead Lake Road off the 17311:06 AM
Tue 7/1 169.150 is the frequency11:06 AM
Tue 7/1From: 40K
To :To Dispatch 171.4750 Big Bear to Lucerne area; we have the same initial address in Lake Arrowhead; one employee states that it looked like it fell in the Lucerne area; another states possible Cottonwood area; {40K} can we have the frequency?11:05 AM
Tue 7/1 Big Bear has no information on overdue or missing aircraft at this time11:03 AM
Tue 7/1From: E291
We aren't finding anything here; we're assuming this is probably something huge and could even be in the Riverside county area. "I think it's going to be way out there in the desert by the time they finally find it." Heading out to Johnson Grade to take a look.11:03 AM
Tue 7/1 contacting Big Bear Airport to make sure there is no missing aircraft from there11:03 AM
Tue 7/1 also a report of near Sycamore Heights near Big Bear11:03 AM
Tue 7/1 We're getting reports from as far away as Nevada, so, whatever it was, it was big.11:02 AM
Tue 7/1From: eng14
To :To Dispatch eng14 - we are checking the 173 area.11:02 AM
Tue 7/1 We think we may have had a large asteroid come down.11:01 AM
Tue 7/1 We're getting reports from all over the mountain.11:01 AM
Tue 7/1 Riverside county fire has reports as far as Temecula of seeing this thing; behind Yucaipa with the mountain with the R11:00 AM
Tue 7/1 Have 111 check the Lucerne side11:00 AM
Tue 7/1 Copy, we're checking the Baldwin Lake area11:00 AM
Tue 7/1 "this thing possibly broke up in the atmosphere and fell over several areas on the mountain top"11:00 AM
Tue 7/1From: Bat 12
Do you have anything showing on the Lucerne valley side? negative at this time.10:59 AM
Tue 7/1From: BDF Dispatch
Calling this Mountain Top incident10:58 AM
Tue 7/1From: Dispatch
To :E291 Getting multiple reports of this now from the Big Bear area; it appears to have gone over the ridgeline in the Butler Peak area and come down on the other side of the ridge. We're going to need a couple of helicopters on this.10:58 AM
Tue 7/1 We are starting Air Attack 12.10:58 AM
Tue 7/1From: BDF Dispatch
Seen from the east side of Big Bear to Arrowhead.10:58 AM
Tue 7/1 Another report from the mountain top area reports that it looked like it landed in Lucerene10:58 AM
Tue 7/1 We have a firefighter who saw this10:57 AM
Tue 7/1 We're also getting a report in the Crab Flats area.10:57 AM
Tue 7/1From: Bat12
To :To Dispatch 171.4750 Engines out of Big Bear Lake responding, I think, to that same call10:56 AM
Tue 7/1 north and east of Lake Arrowhead for now; 40K is going to the Erwin Ranch area10:56 AM
Tue 7/1 This has now been reported by several people, we're gonna get 40K up.10:56 AM
Tue 7/1From: Dispatch 171.4750
To :Bat12 40K is going to check the area; it was witnessed by a couple other people, one being a FS Recreation Unit10:54 AM
Tue 7/1From: Dispatch 171.4750
To :Butler Peak Lookout having Butler Peak take a look in that direction10:54 AM
Tue 7/1 2nd RP reports he saw the same thing, it went over the rdige line and it did impact10:53 AM
Tue 7/1 FAA has not called yet; they usually do in this type of case; requesting 40K to take a look10:51 AM
Tue 7/1 RP describes it almost like a comet10:51 AM
Tue 7/1 RP was looking North by Northeast, can we get 40K up? RP reports he saw a tail section in the flame.10:50 AM
Tue 7/1From: Dispatch 171.4750
To :E11 smoke check; dispatched to RPs address; RP reporting from residence large flame in the sky10:47 AM
Tue 7/1From: Comm Ctr 8Fire1
sitting on deck and saw a ball of flame fall from the sky; RP's address is 27000 block of Cedarwood Drive, Lake Arrowhead10:45 AM
Tue 7/1From: SO Control
To :5Paul? fireball; bright orange; fell into the trees; FD is checking with FAA

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Bright Flash Over San Francisco California

KGO -11/18/08) People around the Bay Area saw a bright flash in the sky this evening, as a meteor apparently streaked past.

Callers to KGO say it appeared to streak low across the sky shortly

after 5:30 p.m.. It could be seen all over the Bay Area and as far north as Woodland. Some said it was bright white, while others said it had a flash of green in it as well.

A local astronomer tells KGO it was a meteor that had a lot of copper in it, which is why some people saw green. This is the time of year when the Leonid meteor showers take place.
San Francisco, CA 94111 Cube Advertisement


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Did a Meteor Hit Lake County? Investigators aren't sure but admit it's a possibility.

Friday, November 14, 2008
By Ken Robinson, Newsradio WTAM 1100


(Madison Township) - Police who spent four hours searching for a plane crash in Lake County now think what people saw and heard could have been a meteor.

You heard it on the Triv Show Thursday afternoon, callers to Newsradio WTAM 1100 provided reports of an object crashing sound in Lake County. Many thought it was an airplane.

The reports sparked a search that involved three helicopters, several police and fire departments and the Ohio Highway Patrol.

Madison Township Police Chief Len DelCalzo explains no airplane wreckage was found. And they had no reports of missing aircraft or missing persons.

They searched an area around Route 20 between McMackin and Townline Road.

DeCalzo speculates that it’s possible, whatever the object was, may have crashed into Lake Erie.

He says a meteor would be ``highly unusual,'' but possible. though, no evidence of a meteor has turned up either.

DeCalzo says anyone with evidence should give them a call, but for now, their investigation is over.

(Copyright 2008 by Clear Channel, all rights reserved.)

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Suspected Ohio Plane Crash May have Been a Meteor

NORTH MADISON (AP) — Authorities who spent four hours searching for a plane crash in northeast Ohio now think what people saw and heard may have been a meteor.

Reports Thursday afternoon of a bright light and trail of smoke in the sky and a separate call about a crashing sound in Lake County northeast of Cleveland sparked a search that involved three helicopters, several police and fire departments and the State Highway Patrol.

Madison Township police Sgt. Rick Barson says based on what the witnesses reported, investigators believed an ultralight plane had gone down. But Barson says no wreckage was found.

He says a meteor would be "highly unusual," though he says even a small one has an explosion on impact.

By nightfall, no evidence of a meteor had turned up either.

Massive search finds no sign of plane crash
Authorities speculate small meteor may have hit

Published November 13, 2008 11:40 pm - Lake County law enforcement, fire and medical crews launched a large-scale search Thursday after hearing two individual accounts of a falling ultra-light airplane, but never found a crash site, Madison Township police Sgt. Rick Barson said.



By MARGIE TRAX PAGE - Staff Writer - mtrax@starbeacon.com
Star Beacon


MADISON TOWNSHIP — Lake County law enforcement, fire and medical crews launched a large-scale search Thursday after hearing two individual accounts of a falling ultra-light airplane, but never found a crash site, Madison Township police Sgt. Rick Barson said.

Following the information of two corroborating 911 calls, Madison and Perry police and fire, along with the Ohio State Highway Patrol and Lake Metroparks rangers searched the area of Haines and McMacken roads, north of Route 20, by foot, vehicle and helicopter for more than three hours, Barson said.

“The first couple of calls led us to believe we were looking for a crashed ultra-light airplane,” Barson said. “We had enough information from two people in separate places that seemed to have seen the same thing, but we had trouble getting a good description that would fit the type of craft we believed this plane could be.”

The search and rescue was assisted by a University Hospitals medical helicopter, which was joined by two other local news helicopters, but the rescuers couldn’t find wreckage, Barson said.

“We are now 100 percent sure there is nothing on the ground,” Barson said. “Given the helicopters in the sky and the coverage of the search on the ground, we are confident there was no crash.”

Barson said the bare trees made the search easier.

“Luckily, the leaves have fallen from the trees so we weren’t working against the clock with a lot of ground cover,” he said.

Barson said the witnesses similar accounts of a bright light in the sky with a trail of smoke behind it and a separate account of a crashing sound in the area gave emergency crews enough cause to conduct a full-scale search and rescue. The officers even saw a damaged tree that fit one witnesses’ story, but there was no wreckage to be found.

Officers confirmed a FirstEnergy airplane flew earlier in the day to check utility lines in the area, but that aircraft landed safely at noon.

The Star Beacon confirmed ultra-light airplane manufacturer Titan Aircraft, based in Austinburg Township, did not have planes in the sky Thursday..

Barson said he believes the anomaly was possibly a very small meteor.

“It is highly unusual,” he said. “But even the very smallest meteor has an explosion at impact. We are out of explanations as to what this could have been.”

Even though the search was unnecessary, Barson said it was not without merit.

“This search was 100 percent warranted,” Barson said. “We have several citizens locally that own or have owned ultra-light airplanes, we have the Perry Nuclear Power Plant right here, we had two eye witness accounts of a crash.”

Barson said local emergency crews were put through their paces during the search and it brought out the best in mutual aid and regional teamwork.

----


Lake County: Search for Possible Downed Aircraft Called Off

LAKE COUNTY -- An extensive search for what emergency callers described as a downed aircraft was called off Thursday evening.


Police and fire units from both Madison and Perry Townships along with the Ohio State Highway Patrol began searching around 2:30 p.m. Thursday.

Investigators say two 9-1-1 calls, received just three minutes apart, described seeing a small plane, possibly an ultra-light, with its nose down. The callers said there was smoke coming from the aircraft and that it appeared to be in distress and may have gone down in the area of Townline Road on the Madison and Perry Township border.

Another call a few hours later to law enforcement reported what the caller said sounded like an explosion near their Townline Road home.

However, after four hours of searching by air, ground and on foot, investigators turned up no sign of a plane or a crash site.

Police say there are a half dozen private airfields in the area.
A check of local airports indicated there was not any plane taking off or landing at the time the emergency calls came in to dispatchers.

Investigators say there is just one resident in the area that has an ultra-light craft and that was not in the air today.

Based on the lack of information that any aircraft in the area was overdue and the lack of any physical evidence of a possible crash site, investigators called off their efforts at dark and say there are no immediate plans to resume their search.


© 2008 WKYC-TV

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Lights In Sky Prompt Flood Of Calls In Md., Va., N.C. USA

 March 30, 2009


BALTIMORE -- A team of scientists is looking into what could have caused bright lights in the sky that prompted hundreds of calls to the National Weather Service and emergency officials.

Callers from Maryland, Virginia and North Carolina described brilliant, streaking lights followed by an explosion-like sound around 9:45 p.m. Sunday.

One 11 News viewer in Carroll County e-mailed to say she "spotted a large fireball in the western sky. It started out being about star brightness, then increasingly got brighter and greener. As it got green, it had an orange sparkling tail...We saw it go almost all the way to the ground before losing sight of it in the trees."

A WBALTV.com visitor who was in Durham, N.C., wrote the following: "I remember seeing something greenish and changing colors. It was leaving a trail (not sure of the color). I never saw it hit the ground either because it faded, got covered by trees, or burnt out."

Another wrote: "I was driving South on Interstate 83 between 9:30 and 10:00 (Sunday) night when my wife and I both saw a streaking green light fall from the sky. It looked like a shooting star, but it was definitely falling to the ground and not shooting across the sky."

Virginia residents from Hampton Roads to Richmond reported seeing "great balls of fire" lighting up the sky in shades of yellow, white orange and blue.

Some described the explosion as sounding like thunder.

Several calls came to Richmond International Airport, but spokesman Troy Bell said tower workers did not see anything unusual.

The weather service said no damage was reported.

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Copyright 2009 by wbaltv.com. The Associated Press contributed to this report. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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