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Remarks |
I had just gotten out of our car under the carport, headed towards our front door. I got 1/3 of the way to the door (maybe 10 yards) when, as I usually do near/after dark, I looked up to see what constellations/planets were up. It was an average dark sky. I could make out the milky way and Cygnus was 1/2 way under the horizon. That was when I spotted the meteor/fireball. It was just left of our roofline and a bit higher moving N/NE to W/SW. At first I thought it was a helicopter with a spot light but the color of the light, size, direction of movement and wispy smoke trail ruled that out quickly. It was larger than any star or planet. Large enough that it was readily recognizable as a disk. I recall yelling to my wife, "Oh, WOW!" but never took my eyes off of it. She had gone around behind our workshop and didn't see it or hear me. The meteor/fireball was not moving excessively fast but due to the size and shape of the display, I judged that it had passed the apex and was moving away from my vantage point. It lasted longer than a blink (I believe I blinked twice before it disappeared). It did not get brighter or less bright in transit. It did not fragment or explode. It just quickly went out leaving a slight smokey trail that evaporated almost as quickly.The smokey trail was not thin or straight. It was rather wavy/wiggly and was much smaller on the right termination, getting larger closer to the meteor/fireball. There was a greenish elongated halo around the meteor/fireball. |
