

Fireball in Texas Sky, Its Origin Unknown - EGF
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/17/us/17debris.html

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sam_in_nyc
Several years ago, I had the privilege to witness a fireball that lasted
nearly 15 seconds from start to finish. I've never again experienced anything
as intense as this, which includes skydiving.

I spotted a tiny white moving dot in the sky. At first, it looked like a
satellite in orbit, only it strangely grew in intensity, until appearing to be
an airplane. 5 seconds in, it began to flicker, grew brighter, and grabbed the
attention of other onlookers. From there, small fragments began coming off as
it increased in brightness and become more of a white-orange color. The
fragmenting pieces themselves also followed suite, breaking off into more
white-orange pieces and leaving glittering trails. The main object then became
quite massive, maybe about half the size of a full moon, with equal to or
greater brightness then a full moon. The ground lit up. The main object was
constantly disintegrating as pieces were breaking off and lagging back into
the trail, breaking off into even more glittering pieces, and producing more
light. Still, the main object only grew in intensity and become more
distinctly orange. I can't be sure, because at this point it was burning spots
into my eyes, which were adjusted for low light, but I believe there was even
a trail of smoke. At this point I remember thinking "holy crap, it's going to
impact way over there!" but instead, it dimmed a bit, and flew past the
horizon. Suddenly, it was like the whole thing had never happened.
Surprisingly, there was no sound from it.

On a related note, did anyone catch the Leonids several years back? That was
also quite amazing.

