Fireball shoots in from outer space
Tuesday 23rd March 2010, 2:56PM GMT.
Patrick Devaney has registered the sighting with the British Astronomical Society
CHANNEL Islanders have been left baffled after what looked like a meteor flashed across the sky on Sunday night.
The fireball was first spotted in Guernsey before hurtling over the east of Jersey seconds later. Residents in both islands reported that the unidentified object was moving very quickly and very low across the sky.
Patrick Devaney, a Guernsey teacher, said that he watched the ‘meteor’ shoot from Herm diagonally over St Peter Port and towards Jersey.
Jersey Met Office confirmed that it received a report from an Islander in Gorey of what appeared to be a meteor ‘dashing very low and very fast’ across the sky at about 10 pm on Sunday. But Jersey’s Air Traffic Control department said that it had not detected anything on its radar.
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“… Jersey’s Air Traffic Control department said that it had not detected anything on its radar.” Isn’t that a bit worrying?
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More then likely at 22.00 they’d shut down and gone home for the night. The UK & Fnch
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French!!!! would be better placed to see! anything,
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The Society for Popular Astronomy would like to thank Mr Devaney for his fireball report and invite reports from any other observers luck enough to have seen this event.
You can find a guide to the information required here:
http://www.popastro.com/sections/meteor/fireball.htm
Many thanks,
David Entwistle
Assistant Meteor Director, Society for Popular Astronomy.
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Maybe was another bit falling off a plane!!
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I saw this! I was at home in St Martin sitting in the lounge watching TV when I noticed through my south facing window an incredibly bright meteor fly south very quickly leaving a trail. Two smaller pieces broke off from the main body before burning out roughly over Maufant Village.
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“Patrick Devaney, a Guernsey teacher, said that he watched the ‘meteor’ shoot from Herm diagonally over St Peter Port and towards Jersey”
Please Sir, where does “diagonally” fit into this account? Or was the observant teacher in Herm and the reporting got skewed?
It is always amusing how parochial these meteor sightings are. They “start” at one place that the observer can identify and fizzle out at another spot at the limit of his field of view. In reality if it was a meteor and not yet another chinese lantern, it would have visibly travelled across thousands of miles of sky.
Why would anyone expect a meteor to show up on ATC radar when those radars nowadays are designed not to show anything other than genuine aircraft?
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I seen the meteor whilst fishing at La Mare. Fantastic sight! It shot almost sideways accross the bay from the east with a big green glow. Thought it was gonna hit the demie light house before it burnt out.
My mate thought it was a giant flare. I made no comment, just sniggered. Head must of been a bit scatty still from his rumble staurday night.
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I too saw the metorite from my window. At first i thought i was seeing things.
Not to worry you guys but the radar would not pick it up anyway! The radar system cannot pick up the meteor shape due to i being a sphere. Radars bounce a signal off of a flat object in the same direction as the beam, it then can tell the distance and speed of the object.
If you dont believe that then how does the stealth bomber hide itself from detection! Another more worrying point is a statement for SETI and NASA stating that if a meteorite was on a collision course with the earth we would not know! the satalite would have to be in the right place to pick it up which is a 1 in a billion chance! Were all doomed! lol
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Let’s get this right…
It started off in Herm, went “diagonally” to Jersey via St Peter Port, burned out over Maufant and then must have gone towards La Rocque in order to go from East to West going “almost sideways” past La Mare then almost hit the Demi.
Obviously this meteor was taking evasive action against vigilant radars.
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Guernsey are doing secret high grade stealth weapon testing! I knew it!
More likely – A small meteor. complete bummer I didnt get to see it though.
dont knwo what the weather was like that night, Ball lightening perhaps? But I doubt it.
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“dont knwo what the weather was like that night, Ball lightening perhaps?”
If I remember correctly, mine seemed heavier that night!
Must have been the atmospheric pressure. (I was playing Ping Pong at the time).
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i live in halifax and have all my life, i have had many experiences with our alien neighbours, in 1976 fire balls were flying over the luddenden foot area commmanly known as the calder valley, i saw at least 3 over a 6 week period so did my brother sometimes we had seen the same fire ball (craft) when we were in different areas of the valley, these fire balls left a fire trail ,stopped and started at will and had no noise, they just flew silent smooth and low across the valley just missing the peak of the hillsides ,love to know why they are back,i`ve waited a long time to see them again .lolly west yorkshire
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Would just like to say to Mr.Doubting Thomas, aka Mr. C Le Verdic, that I really wish you could have been there to se what I saw. I am not a nut, I believe I have been misqouted, as I never mentioned the word diagonally, I said that the object shot across the sky while I was looking out to herm and appeared to dissapear again over St.Peter Port. At the time I was very worried because of the sheer size of the thing-it was so low in the sky that it actually appeared to be of a substantial size. It may well have been part of space junk entering the atmosphere, but whatever it was, it was an extremely beautiful site. Mr. C Le Verdic may also wish to know that several people in Guernsey have come forwards to confirm my sighting, all from the west coast heading in the general direction of Jersey and he may also wish to note the sitings in Jersey itself.
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No problem, Patrick. I’d already assumed that the unexplained change of direction took place in a journalist’s licence rather than what you originally told them, hence my comment about the reporting getting skewed. I’ve yet to hear of anything coming from space that doesn’t go in a straight line!
Your account above sounds totally real. However I would still be very surprised if the object was not considerably higher. It would be interesting to know whether there were any sightings further back in the path such as Cornwall, Ireland or even Iceland and subsequently over France. I would suggest that the picture is bigger than local observers might think.
I’m not here purely to pick holes in things, more to provoke wider thinking!
C Le V.
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