[StephenS]

First reports of what appears to be a meteor/fireball:

http://www.bbc.co.uk.../world-17248959

Sky News has shown some shaky mobile footage - looks quite impressive!

[Faymondo]

Been following Twitter as this passed over. Loads of reports and video below doesn't do it justice apparently



Gutted I missed it

[Dave Hancox]

Was back shift tonight and missed this a cracker by the looks of it,
No calls came in for this area when I was on.

[Jason Smith]

The UK Meteor is reported to have been one of the best in 30 years and great to see early reports and video already. The UK police state they have received a large amount of calls reporting the bright trail across the sky.

[Halo]

It doesn't surprise me that there are numerous reports of this. Luckily I happened to see it. From my vantage point it moved on what appeared to be a southerly trajectory, covering much of the eastern semicircle. It's altitude throughout was between 30-40 degrees above the horizon. I saw a slight yellowish tint to the meteor, and there were sparks coming from it. It was tear-drop shaped but didn't seem to leave a long trail. It passed through 90 per cent of the sky. The back end of the tear drop quivered from side to side rapidly, a bit like a tadpole swimming. It seemed to last ages and only slowly faded with an orange-red hue, a bit like a jet's afterburner might look, or how a chinese lantern would slowly burn out. The only thing I couldn't do is estimate its magnitude exactly because I was in a lit-up area but it was certainly comparable to Venus, and certainly brighter than Mars and Jupiter. This occurred between 2135Z-2145Z 3 March.

[John Mason]

Sounds most impressive! Didn't see anything here but is was rather cloudy compared to areas further east. Wonder if any of it made landfall?

Cheers - John

[Sam Jowett]

Another video taken from Whitley Bay...

[kevin paxton]

Missed this spectical last night ,however there may be alot of coverage of this on phones and cameras as houndreds of people were around whitley bay last night watching some lazer beams projected from st marys island,we ed just left 15mins earlier and were just in the house......typical.....

[Kevin Kerr]

I saw it here at Loudoun Hill in Ayrshire, the light caught my eye out of the window which faces East. At first it looked like a firework and I expected it to be short lived and then I realised what I looking at, the speed was surprisingly slow , very bright with a bright orange glow and nice long tail, we watched if for a good 20 seconds until it was out of view behind the trees. Luckily for us we are in an area with no streetlights and hence probably got one of the best views. I thought this was quite localised until I saw the news this morning.

[Alastair McBeath]

As you might expect, it's been rather a chaotic day at the SPA Meteor Section, with reports arriving at anything up to 17 an hour by e-mail since 22:00 last night (March 3)!

By 22:00 tonight (March 4), 43 reports on this meteor had been received from all across Scotland and England, including news of at least three images/videos. This is only a very preliminary review of some of my early findings from these sightings. So far, time has not allowed an analysis of the object's more probable trajectory, although a general north to south path seems likely from first impressions.

Most of the observations as yet have come from Scotland and northern England (71%), and there seems a possibility that the meteor was at its brightest early in its flight near this part of the UK, fading somewhat later, as in general, the observers further north saw the meteor as brighter (perhaps around magnitudes -7 to -10) compared to observers in the southern half of England (-3 to -5). The fade, if real, seems to have been fairly gentle (there is the possibility skies were more transparent further north, which could also have affected the perceived brightness).

Observers further north also seem in general to have seen more of the flight, as estimates for the visible duration here tended to be longer than those further south. In all cases though, the meteor appeared to be unusually persistent, lasting probably between 15 to 30 seconds judging by the better estimates for the full flight so far.

There was quite a degree of scatter in the estimated timings for when the fireball appeared (possibly affected by how long the object remained in-view as well), but the average of 38 estimates was within half a minute of 21:42 UT on March 3-4.

Numerous different colours were reported, sometimes in multiples, with some witnesses mentioning different hues were spotted in the head and the tail. However, and excluding the often-default "white", there was a general pattern preferring colours for the main fireball in the red-orange-yellow range than anything else. Even including white, 67% favoured this range.

Naturally, these first findings are subject to revision as more data arrives, and as ever, all further reports would be most welcome!

The three key elements to mention are:

1) Exactly where you were (give the name of the nearest town or large village and county in Britain);

2) The date and timing of the event; and

3) Where the fireball started and ended in the sky, as accurately as possible, or where the first and last points you could see of the trail were if you didn't see the whole flight.

More advice on what to report and where to from any fireball observations (a fireball is any meteor of magnitude -3 or brighter) made from the UK and nearby is available on a separate Space Weather Forum topic, at:

http://www.ukweather...ball-reporting/ .

Alastair McBeath,
Meteor Director, Society for Popular Astronomy.

[Jez Meyer]

I saw the fireball for at least 15-20 seconds, extremely long bright orange trail which was slow to fade. I was in a village just to the East of Durham, and saw it travel on my eastern side in what I think was a southerly direction.

I could not hazard a guess at magnitude as I have no experience whatsoever with meteors nor that scale, but at first I was convinced it was a firework I was seeing. It was significantly less bright than the moon, but significantly brighter and larger than any of the planets. I would say that the 'head' of the meteor appeared to me almost the same brightness as a passenger plane with its lights on, but the straightness of its path/its speed/its trail show it to have not been any aircraft. The trail itself was a very vibrant orange, like to welding sparks. At its maximum length, the trail was about a hand's width with my arm fully extended.

As for the time, the most I can say is that it was a few minutes before 21:45 as that is when the bus I was waiting for arrived. I hope this is of some help!

[nev47]

look like someones found itMy link

[Halo]

My colleague was speaking to someone yesterday who had also seen the meteor out of his bedroom window. Wish I had spoken to him myself.

As for the Daily Mail article:

1) If I found something that I might think could be a meteorite I would have it confirmed by sending a piece for proper analysis, comparing with pictures from the internet means nothing.
2) She found it in Cleveland in which case I, and many others much further south, wouldn't have seen the object at all!

So I'm afraid...nay!

[nev47]

ur right halo someones on the ball tonight.

[nev47]

so maybe more than one that night one at 2145 and around midnight ?

[Alastair McBeath]

I've now completed a first analysis for this fireball's probable trajectory, and can update the notes I posted here last night, based on the initial 43 observations mentioned then. The tally of sightings has increased substantially since, but I've not had time to add those into the analysis as yet.

First-off, nobody seems to have seen or imaged the entire trail, as it appears to have been exceptionally long.

The start may have been high above the sea somewhere between the Faeroe, Shetland and Orkney Islands. However, a visible start height had to be assumed at between 140-90 km to determine this rough area, as only one witness's report for the beginning was available, that of an experienced astronomical observer near the Moray Firth coast. If correct, this would have put the start likely within 70 km or so of 3.9° W, 60.5° N.

The meteor then appeared to have followed a generally NNW to SSE trending path from there. Its projected surface track probably cut across Orkney Mainland as its first landfall, before possibly grazing Duncansby Head, then over the Moray Firth towards the "Aberdeen Angle" of northern Scotland. Its land track there was likely from about Banff to Inverbervie.

Flitting across the North Sea off the Firth of Forth after that, the start of its final landfall was probably near Lindisfarne on the north Northumberland coast. As suggested by the Whitley Bay video, it probably passed almost overhead for several cities in northeast England, including Newcastle, Gateshead and Durham, then tracked south roughly parallel to the Pennines, albeit some way to their east, down much of the length of England.

Its end was much better-observed than its start, and was probably within 25 km of a point near Bozeat, Northamptonshire, close to the Northants-Beds-Bucks border, around 0°45.3' W, 52°13.3' N. The average value best-estimated for its final visible height was 61.6 ± 8.5 km.

Assuming this path was roughly correct, the fireball's intra-atmospheric trajectory would have been between 1060 and 900 km long, descending at between 5° to 2° from the horizontal, so literally skimming along the meteor layer in the upper atmosphere.

Given that nobody saw the whole trail after all, I have attempted to correct for the approximate parts of this path not seen by the witnesses who estimated the flight-time, and although this is less certain, it seems plausible the duration was around 30-45 seconds for the entire visible flight. If so, this would compute to an atmospheric velocity range, not allowing for deceleration, of order 27 ± 5 km/sec, thus meteorically slow to slow-medium in speed. (Meteor atmospheric-entry velocities range from circa 11 to 72 km/sec.)

Sadly, such a grazing path would make the chance for any meteorites surviving to reach the surface extremely small, and also make it impossible to usefully identify anything other than a huge potential surface area into which they might have dropped anyway.

As before, please remember that this is just a preliminary analysis, so is subject to revision later as fresh results come through. It also has to attempt to compromise between what can be conflicting information provided by different witnesses. However, there is a logical consistency in the findings so far, despite the very unusual long-lived nature of this event.

And for those of you who, like me, were indoors at the critical instant, I note that the estimated trajectory would likely have carried it virtually overhead for my site in NE England...

Alastair McBeath,
Meteor Director, Society for Popular Astronomy.

[Alastair McBeath]

I've finally completed the analysis of this March 3-4, circa 21:41-21:42 UT fireball widely-seen from the UK. It's been a long haul, as excluding duplicates, I've dealt with 376 observations in the end, from all across Scotland, England and northeastern Wales. I've posted full details on what could be established about the meteor today on the SPA's Observing Forum, at:

http://www.popastro....pic.php?t=16810 ,

which includes links to many of the original reports and images/videos, as well as to notes on four or perhaps five other UK-reported fireballs that night.

Now I'm hoping I can catch up with the outstanding correspondence this has all generated!

Alastair McBeath,
Meteor Director, Society for Popular Astronomy.

[Halo]

Is it too late to fill in a form now that you have done an analysis? (I keep forgetting!)

[Alastair McBeath]

Halo: No, you're welcome to still send in a fuller report on what you saw, though I have already taken your earlier comments into account in the analysis. The only snag is that the longer you leave it, the less chance your recollection will be fully accurate, unless you wrote the details down immediately after seeing the meteor.

Alastair McBeath,
Meteor Director, Society for Popular Astronomy.