Okay, maybe it’s not that cut and dry (the earth hits meteors all the time – they just disintegrate before hitting ground). Tonight about half of all my Utah friends all at one time reported a light, as bright as day, ascend in a blue-green aura from East to West. For some reason I missed it, although I was up during the event. It turns out Utah got to experience one of the closest calls of the Leonid Meteor shower tonight. Some are saying it was only 13 miles high.
Stories are surfacing from Utah to Las Vegas of bright lights, “turning the night to day”. One was even in a plane when it happened, and the ground lit up like it was day. According to Fox13Now.com, University of Utah Physics Professor Patrick Higgins said the light was most likely a Bolide Meteor, which, according to Wikipedia, is just an exceptionally bright, fireball-like meteor that lights up the sky.
Twitter user @sunsetlover68 has been sharing what she’s seen tonight, stating she saw at least 3 or 4 big meteors after the first one. The second one looked like the picture to the right (I’m unsure of the source). She also shared a video of her security cameras, which show what it looked like from the ground – as you can see it truly did light up the entire landscape!
I don’t know much about meteors, but is this a frequent occurance? How close does the earth actually get to these things and how often? Leave your comments below.
Photo source Fox13Now.com
