Fireball seen in night sky across southern Queensland
Richard Dinnen - Queensland Editor |
A blazing fireball streaked across the southern Queensland skies last night, with sightings reported across a large area.
The Australian Meteor Reports Facebook group posted news of the sightings, saying the fireball was seen around 7.45 on Saturday night.
The post said witnesses had also reported hearing a sonic boom across a wide area.
Based on witness reports, the group post said it’s likely the object was a small asteroid entering the earth’s atmosphere over Australia, and pieces of it might have survived to land on the ground.
It later announced the likely area of landfall was between Grandchester, Calvert, and Cottonvale in south-east Queensland.
Members of the Facebook group reported seeing the object from the Gold and Sunshine coasts west to the Darling Downs. Sightings were also reported from Mullumbimby, Tenterfield, Nimbin and several other locations in northern New South Wales.
Many witnesses said the sighting lasted a surprisingly long time, and that the object was spectacularly bright.
Objects entering the upper atmosphere heat up due to friction, with the heat causing gases around the object to glow brightly.
Most such objects occur about 50 to 80 kilometres above the earth’s surface, where they reach speeds of up to 70 kilometres per second.
