Two videos have surfaced that appear to capture the blazing, 34,000 mile-per-hour ‘daylight fireball’ that soared over New York’s Statue of Liberty on Tuesday.
One video, pulled from a Nest home security camera in Wayne, New Jersey, shows a gleaming white streak of light hurtling through the morning sky — at a distance over 50 miles away from the flaming object as it disintegrated in Earth’s atmosphere.
NASA revealed Tuesday that the ‘fireball’ had plummeted ‘at a steep angle of just 18 degrees from vertical’ before ‘disintegrating 29 miles above midtown Manhattan.’
The two videos were submitted by amateur sky-watchers with the American Meteor Society, which has now logged dozens of possible witnesses to the meteor, some reportedly shaking from its earthquake-like rumble and startling loud ‘boom.’
The second video, recorded in Northford, Connecticut, shows more high-resolution images of the fireball as it burned over forested hills like a midday shooting star.
Two videos have surfaced that appear to capture the blazing, 34,000 mile-per-hour ‘daylight fireball’ meteor that soared over New York’s Statue of Liberty on Tuesday. One video was pulled from a Nest home security camera in Wayne, New Jersey (still image above)
The head of NASA’s Meteoroid Environments Office, Bill Cooke, previously thanked the society for collecting its public meteor sighting data which had allowed the US space agency to make ‘a very crude determination of the trajectory of the meteor.’
The American Meteor Society issued a caveat that the two new fireball videos, posted to their official YouTube channel, ‘may not be related to a fireball event.’
Both videos, along with a running total of 43 witness reports, however, did coincide with the time (11:15am eastern) and proximity of Thursday’s ‘fireball’ event.
Trackers with the nonprofit society, founded in 1911, have now mapped reports of the fireball across the tri-state area, from New Jersey, New York and Connecticut — and beyond into Rhode Island, Delaware, Pennsylvania and Maryland.
‘It just caught my eye: a fireball just streaming through the sky,’ as one eyewitness, Judah Bergman, told local NBC News New York. ‘I couldn’t believe it.’
The second video, recorded from Northford, Connecticut (still above), shows a more high-resolution image of the fireball as it burned above forested hills like a midday shooting star
A close up of the fireball from the second video, American Meteor Society report 3491ah-2024
Multiple government agencies leapt into action to identify the mysterious, rattling explosion, including NASA’s Meteoroid Environments Office and the United States Geological Survey’s (USGS) National Earthquake Information Center.
‘I personally spoke with NYC Emergency Management, and there is nothing on their radar,’ New York City councilmember Justin Brannan posted to Facebook.
‘Some say maybe a meteor?’ Brannan continued. ‘Will keep you posted.’
But NASA noted there was evidence for an alternative explanation.
‘There are reports of military in the vicinity around the time of the fireball,’ the space agency said, ‘which could explain the shaking and sounds reported to the media.’
Despite NASA’s caveat, however, Pentagon officials told NBC New York that neither the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD), nor any other US military sensor network, had tracked anything that could explain the witness reports.
Astronomer and lead for NASA’s Meteoroid Environments Office, Bill Cooke, said the daylight fireball was first spotted at 11:17am local time near Greenville Yard, a freight rail yard located at the Port of New York and New Jersey: ‘moving a bit east of North at 34,000 miles per hour’
‘It just caught me eye: a fireball just streaming through the sky,’ eyewitness Judah Bergman told the local NBC news affiliate. ‘I couldn’t believe it.’ Above, a still from the 1998 film Armageddon, in which space rocks threaten the Earth, including the city of New York
Astronomer and lead for NASA’s Meteoroid Environments Office, Bill Cooke, issued a statement on the limited facts about the event that are currently known.
According to Cooke, the daylight fireball was first spotted at 11:17am local time near Greenville Yard, a freight rail yard located at the Port of New York and New Jersey.
‘The fireball was first sighted at an altitude of 49 miles above Upper Bay (east of Greenville Yard),’ Cooke said.
Despite resident accounts of physical rattling and shaking along the fireball’s path — reportedly from northeast New Jersey and Staten Island, New York — the USGS stated in an official statement that it recorded no evidence of an earthquake.
‘An examination of the seismic data in the area showed no evidence of an earthquake. The USGS has no direct evidence of the source of the shaking,’ the federal agency’s National Earthquake Information Center said.
‘Past reports of shaking with no associated seismic signal have had atmospheric origins,’ the USGS advised, ‘such as sonic booms or weather-related phenomena.’
NASA officials cautioned that its own assessment of the fireball sightings from this Tuesday was ‘uncertain’ and based on only ‘a few eyewitness accounts.’
