FIRE IN THE SKY: Meteor Sighted From San Diego Early Thursday, According To The American Meteor Society - Over 110 Eye-Witnesses Reported A Large Blue-Green Fireball; Also Seen Over Arizona!

File photo.

February 11, 2016 - CALIFORNIA, UNITED STATES - A meteoroid burned up in the atmosphere early Thursday, producing a fireball that was seen by people across San Diego County, according to the American Meteor Society.

"More than 110 witnesses have reported a large blue-green fireball over Southern California on Februray 11th around 6:35am PT (14:35 UT)," the AMS says online. "The fireball was seen primarily from California but witnesses from Arizona also reported seeing the fireball."

The eyewitnesses include Francis French, education director at the San Diego Air & Space Museum. He saw the meteor while he was driving to work on state Road 94.

"The front of the light looked like the arc of a welder's torch; it was blue and incredibly bright," said Francis French, education director at the San Diego Air & Space Museum in Balboa Park. "And it had a yellowish tail that was very textured."

The American Meteor Society shows areas in Southern California where people reported seeing the meteor. The highest number of sightings are depicted in red.
American Meteor Society

Another eyewitness, Harold McManus, said, "I was accessing Sunset Cliffs via Pt. Loma Nazarine University campus. I was on the bluffs about to climb down to the beach when I saw it. It came in from the north almost horizontal. It had a slight downward accent as it headed to the south. I was looking west over the ocean.

"It was spectacular. Bright green like a welders arc with a long tail and relatively slow moving. It fragmented into several pieces as it died. They looked like little sparks. I looked at my watch as I was going to report it to the AMS. It was 6:37. The sky was starting to get light. - The San Diego Tribune.

FIRE IN THE SKY: "Meteor Season Is Back" - Springtime's Lyrid Meteor Shower Beginning To Bloom In The Night Skies This Week!

April 17, 2013 - SPACE - Like a spring flower, the annual Lyrid meteor shower is about to blossom in the night sky, and you've got several days to catch sight of the bloom as it grows.

"Meteor season is back!" photographer Jeff Berkes exulted in an email.

A meteor streaks through starry skies in a picture captured by photographer Jeff Berkes on Sunday from Blackwater National Wildlife Refuge in southern Maryland. Jeff Berkes Photography. Check out Berkes' Facebook page for more.

Although it's not the year's best shooting-star display, the Lyrids serve as a harbinger of spring and warmer days for skywatchers in the Northern Hemisphere. At its peak, on the night of April 21-22, the meteors should flash every three to six minutes or so. But that's the expected rate under ideal conditions: clear skies, far from city lights, with no sources of glare in the sky.

Unfortunately, there'll be one big source of glare this time around: the moon, which will be nearing its full phase on the best night. That would be an argument for getting out a couple of hours before dawn sometime in the days ahead, to catch the early meteors in darker skies. That's how Berkes captured his primo image of a meteor streak against the backdrop of the Milky Way.

"I had been traveling for days while sleeping out of my car as I continue my dark sky projects," the Pennsylvania-based photographer wrote. "I drove over 1,000 miles in three days, visited several states, and came home with over 3,000 pictures in addition to some time-lapse work. After spending two days in the Outer Banks of North Carolina, I decided to move north to have a chance at viewing the northern lights Saturday night into Sunday morning. While I waited for the polar activity to pick up, I set up a couple of cameras up in different locations. I ended up capturing this meteor before I drove to a fourth location around 4 a.m. The best part is watching a meteor fall right through the middle of your frame. It was a beautiful way to end the trip, and a good sign that the Lyrids are coming!"

Like other meteor showers, the Lyrids are sparked by the cosmic debris left behind by a comet. In this case, the debris comes from Comet Thatcher, which comes around every 415 years. Every April, when our planet passes through the trail of bits left behind by the comet, some of those bits zoom through Earth's upper atmosphere and ionize the air. That's what creates the meteor streaks. The Lyrids are so named because the streaks appear to emanate from a point in the constellation Lyra.

Don't expect to see fireworks: "Rates this early in the activity curve would be low, less than one per hour no matter your location," Robert Lunsford of the American Meteor Society says on the MeteorObs mailing list. But if you're lucky, you could spot a fireball like the one that skywatcher Salvador Aguirre reported from Mexico. If you do get snapshots of meteors blooming, feel free to share it with us via our FirstPerson photo-upload page. We'll pass along more pictures as the Lyrids blossom. - NBC News.

WATCH: Lyrid meteor shower set to light up the night sky.

FIRE IN THE SKY: Multicolored Fireball Blazes Over Northeastern United States On January 5, 2013 - The American Meteor Society Received 50 Reports!

January 13, 2013 - UNITED STATES - The American Meteor Society has received 50 reports of a bright meteor that occurred near 06:33 EST on Saturday evening January 5, 2013. Brightness estimates of this fireball vary considerably, but the average lies near magnitude -18, which lies between the light produced by the full moon and the sun. Every color of the rainbow has been reported with green being most mentioned. Below is a map of the witness reports for the NE USA fireball event and can also be found in the fireball logs, refer to event 28 for 2013.

For those not familiar with meteors and fireballs, a fireball is a meteor that is larger than normal. Most meteors are only the size of small pebbles. A meteor the size of a softball can produce light equivalent to the full moon for a short instant. The reason for this is the extreme velocity at which these objects strike the atmosphere. Even the slowest meteors are still traveling at 10 miles per SECOND, which is much faster than a speeding bullet. Fireballs occur every day over all parts of the Earth. It is rare though for an individual to see more than one or two per lifetime as they also occur during the day, on a cloudy night, or over a remote area where no one sees it. Observing during one of the major annual meteor showers can increase your chance of seeing another one of these bright meteors.

January 5th, 2013 East Coast Fireball. © American Meteor Society.

Meteors often appear much closer than they really are. I receive countless reports that the object landed just over the hill when in fact it was several hundred miles away and was witnessed over several states. It is your perspective that makes meteors appear to strike the horizon when in fact they are still high in the atmosphere. This is much like a jetliner seen low in your sky. It appears low to you but for someone located many miles away in that direction, the jetliner is passing high overhead. Meteors become visible at approximately 50 miles above the Earth's surface. Friction slows these objects down until they fall below the velocity necessary to produce light. At this point they still lie at least 5 miles high in the sky. They are invisible below this altitude and cannot be seen as they basically free falling to the ground at 200mph. Very few meteors actually reach the ground as 99.99% completely disintegrate while still 10-20 miles up in the atmosphere. - American Meteor Society.