Several eyewitnesses in the central Florida region reported seeing a bright fireball, which was also detected by two NASA all sky meteor cameras at Embry Riddle Aeronautical University and KSC. The data from these camera show that the object - which was a fragment of an asteroid about 2 inches in diameter - first began to ablate 56 miles above Polk City, Florida. It moved north of west for some 41 miles at 56,000 miles per hour before completely burning up above the swamp south of Brooksville. At its brightest, the fireball was about 3 times more luminous than the planet Venus; no meteorites are believed to be produced by this event, as it was still moving fast (31,000 miles per hour) at its terminal altitude.
Event ID | 20180717-020513 |
Date (UTC) | July 17, 2018 |
Time (UTC) | 02:05:13 |
AMS Event | 2427-2018 |
Size | 2 inches |
Origin | Asteroidal |
NASA Camera Start Lat/Lon | +28.157, -81.710 |
NASA Camera End Lat/Lon | +28.379, -82.351 |
NASA Camera Altitude | 90.0 km → 38.3 km ( 55.9 miles→ 23.8 miles) |
NASA Camera Speed | 25.1 km/s (56,100 mph) |
Chicken Little Start Lat/Lon | +28.321, -81.701 |
Chicken Little End Lat/Lon | +28.400, -82.326 |
Chicken Little Altitude | 71.3 km → 52.2 km ( 44.3 miles→ 32.4 miles) |
Chicken Little Speed | 18.7 km/s (41,800 mph) |