Great balls of fire! Dashcam captures meteor in Wokingham
A FIREBALL that crashed to earth on Saturday evening was captured on dashcam footage by a Wokingham man.
Joe Nam contacted Wokingham Today after witnessing the meteor while driving on Keephatch Gardens, east of the town, at 6.40pm on Saturday, March 2.
He said: “I noticed a strong flash trail in the sky. Its movement was very fast and lasted for about three seconds.
“It looked like it landed on the other side of A329(M).
“I didn’t know what it was. I thought it could have been a meteor or other strange object, but I am very sure it was not fireworks.”
To answer Joe’s question, we reached out to the Royal Observatory at Greenwich, who confirmed what he saw was very likely a fireball.
Edward Bloomer, senior astronomer at the Royal Observatory Greenwich, told Wokingham Today: “Although nothing was reported directly to us, a fireball was reported at almost the same time, so it’s a strong possibility that is what was seen.
He added that the material could have hit at a speed of close to 70 kilometres per second.
“The ‘flaring’ you see only lasts for a short time, but that is likely to destroy the majority of material.
“The original was likely only the size of a grapefruit to begin with, so any remains are probably tiny.
Usually the destruction is pretty complete.”
He added that if this was the same object, it would actually put this several hundred kilometres away by its end.
Reports of shooting stars, meteors and fireballs are becoming increasingly common.
He added: “Increasing use of dashcams and doorbell cameras means people are seeing and sharing this stuff more and more.
“And they’re reporting it too, which is good because it builds up astronomer’s data of what is going on.”
Dr James O’Donoghue, planetary scientist at the University of Reading, told Wokingham Today: “The object appears to be a meteor entering and slowing down in the atmosphere.
“It is frictionally heating the atmosphere in front of it to about 1,600 degrees celsius, which causes the atmosphere to glow brightly.
“Eventually that same heat causes the meteor to expand, crack and explode into fragments, which is what we might be seeing in the video.
“The meteor looks like it would outshine Venus, so we can call it a fireball.
“It was likely travelling at tens of kilometres per second just prior to entry, which is fast enough to get from Wokingham to central London in about three seconds.”
The American Meteor Society collects reports of similar observations, and it saw more than 80 reports of similar sightings at roughly the same time on Saturday evening, from as far afield as eastern England, the Netherlands and Germany.
Based on the information provided, it calculated the object splashed down into the North Sea roughly halfway between Eastern England and the Netherlands.
■ Did you see the object? We’d love to hear your observations. Email news@wokingham.today