Car and street surveillance cameras caught the impressive fireball on film as it lit up the night skies in northeastern China just past the stroke of midnight, local time on October 11. The fireball was so bright it was able to cast shadows, and a freeze frame of the video could easily be mistaken for being filmed in broad daylight. Scientists from the Purple Mountain Observatory of the Chinese Academy of Sciences are currently reviewing the footage to determine what cosmic object caused the light display, although no fragments of meteors have been found in or around the area, according to state-run media outlet CCTV.
There have also been no reports of injuries or damage to buildings in the area.
However, it is likely a fragment from a comet or a meteorite as Earth is passing through comet debris right now.
Our planet is moving through the debris trail left by the Halley’s Comet – now more formally known as Comet 1P/Halley.
Rock and ice falls from the comet, which passes Earth in October every year, burning up as they hit Earth’s atmosphere.
The Orionids are expected to peak on the night of Tuesday, October 22. However, a luminous Moon will disrupt the view of the meteor shower until shortly before dawn.
The Orionid meteors appear every year, with showers usually producing approximately 20 meteors every hour and is active from October 2 through to November 7.
However, explosions from meteorite impacts are rarely this large, so it could mean that more eyes are needed on the skies to protect Earth from massive space rocks.
NASA, which has established a Planetary Defense Coordination Office (PDCO) that is working on ways to protect the world from asteroids, has previously admitted that protection levels are “nowhere near what we need.”
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NASA is currently studying Asteroid Bennu, where its OSIRIS-Rex spacecraft arrived last year.
Part of the reason NASA is sending the OSIRIS-Rex spacecraft there is to gather more information about the space rock which is 500 metres in length.
NASA fears that the asteroid, which has the potential to wipe out a country on Earth, could hit our planet within the next 120 years, with the next close flyby in 2135.
The mission will give vital information on how to deflect asteroids from their collision course with Earth.
