A fireball "about 10 times brighter than a full moon" was spotted in three Southern states, scientists confirmed on Thursday.
The exceptionally bright meteor was first sighted by more than 30 people - 54 miles above Arkansas, Louisiana and Mississippi - around 8 a.m. Wednesday, News19 reported. Hardly seen, the loud boom it created was heard across Claiborne County, Mississippi, and surrounding counties, according to NASA. At a speed of 55,000 miles per hour, the 'bolide' moved southwest and broke into pieces as it dove deeper into Earth's surface.
"This is one of the nicer events I have seen in the GLM data," said Bill Cooke, lead of NASA's Meteoroid Environments Office at Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama.
The object that exploded over Mississippi with the "energy equivalent of 3 tons of TNT" disintegrated about 34 miles above a swampy area north of the unincorporated Concordia Parish community of Minorca in Louisiana and was found in the Natchez area, NOLA told.
"The fragmentation created shock waves that propagated to the ground, producing the booms and vibrations felt by individuals in the area," according to NASA.
'More Heard than Seen'
The fireball lit up skies above three Southern states, but was mostly heard than seen, according to NASA.
"What struck me as unusual was how few eyewitnesses reports we had given the skies were so clear," said Cooke. "More people heard it than saw it."
NOAA's Geostationary Lightning Mappers (GLM) onboard the Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellites (GOES) 16 and 17 detected several bright flashes along with the fragmentation of this meteor, which generated an energy equivalent of 3 tons of TNT (trinitrotoluene).
"At its peak, the fireball was over ten times brighter than the full moon," NASA said. One witness said that she looked up and saw an "orange fireball the size of a basketball, with a white tail behind it," heading west toward the Mississippi River, after hearing the loud noise.
The Claiborne County Emergency Management Agency confirms the reports on Facebook.
"Citizens of Claiborne County, local officials are aware of the loud sound that was heard throughout the county," the Facebook post read. "Grand Gulf Nuclear Station was not involved in this occurrence and the site is secure. There is no threat to the county and no action is to be taken."
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'Worth a Fair Money'
Majority of meteorites which are fairly common are 'ordinary chondrites', as per NASA. Depending on the type, these verified meteorites "can be worth a fair amount of money," the agency added. Finding anything of this value is hard.
"The pieces from this object were way too small to leave a crater. Unlike what you see in the movies, meteorites are not 'flaming rocks of doom' that blast holes in the ground," NASA explained. You may picture a smoking rock as this kind of object land but as a matter of fact, "you can pick one up right after it hits ground."
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