Some residents in East Coulee and Drumheller reported a blast of light streaking through the night sky, perhaps similar to this photo, on Sunday, March 8
A few area residents were treated to a rare sight Sunday evening as a fireball blasted through the sky.
Reports have come in from East Coulee and Drumheller of a blast of light streaking through the night sky.
Lance Tanke said he witnessed the phenomenon driving in from Calgary after the Tim Horton's Brier Sunday night.
“I was just on Highway 9 west of Highway 21,” he tells The Mail. “The sky sort of lit up, and then I saw something coming out of the sky. I wasn’t sure if it was something lighting up the sky or the oncoming headlights, but when I got home, someone else said they saw it on Facebook.”
He said the fireball was right in front of him as he headed east towards Drumheller.
"It was pretty cool to see,” said Tanke. “I have seen a shooting star, but I have never seen something light up the sky like that.”
He adds he has heard reports as far away as Saskatchewan of people also seeing the fireball.
Theresa Fomradas said it was around 10:30 p.m. when she saw the fireball. She said it appeared to be travelling from south to north.
"It was like lightning lit the sky without seeing the bolt of lightning. It only lasted a second or two. Very quick,” she said.
Darryl Reid, of Night Images, has become an expert at photographing the sky at night and said describing it as a fireball is apt.
“I would surmise that is exactly what they saw - it is what they call a fireball,’ said Reid. “A fireball is different from a meteor because of scale. Meteors are frequently the size of a pea and when they come in, they burn up, and we see a quick flash across the sky.”
This is what is commonly known as a shooting star.
“Fireballs can be things the size of a cooler, a car, or even a house, and when they come in, they heat up to the point that they explode. They look like a comet streaking across the sky."
He did not see Sunday night’s phenomenon, but says he's seen ones like it and says they are rare.
“They are unpredictable because they are just pieces of rock floating around the sun like us, and they run into us when they get caught up in our atmosphere when the earth’s gravity pulls them in. Occasionally a piece will survive and then it becomes a meteorite,” said Reid.
A couple weeks ago, there was a report of another flash in the sky that was visible from Calgary. This turned out to be a rocket body from the launch of a Chinese satellite. Reid says the most likely explanation for Sunday’s sighting was a meteor and says it's not a bad thing that this kind of material burns up as it enters.
“That is good for us because there is a lot of this stuff floating around up there and it's all eventually going to fall down."
