Source: (Photo by Owen Humphreys/PA Images/Getty Images
BLOOMINGTON, Ind. — If you were awake late one night in late September in Monroe County, you might have seen or heard a bright flash of light over Bloomington.
The phenomenon was caught by a Ring doorbell camera and scientists at Purdue University have been studying the footage ever since. They’ve concluded the bright flash was likely a “Fireball.” In more scientific terms, a Fireball is a meteor that vaporizes and explodes while entering the Earth’s atmosphere.
Dr. Brandon Johnson, an associate professor of planetary sciences at Purdue said he believes it came from a meteor shower.
“I think it’s probably from one of these meteor showers, which means it’s essentially from debris from a comet, which means it’s icy stuff,” he said on WISH-TV. “(It’s likely that) this got completely vaporized in the atmosphere rather than leaving a meteorite on the ground.”
Last year a similar phenomenon happened over Brown, Bartholomew, and Monroe Counties when a large flash of light and a loud boom were heard. That too was determined to be a meteor.
Johnson said there are only two recorded incidents ever of a meteor hitting someone’s property or hurting them.
