March 17 (Reuters) – A kaboom, a fireball and white streaks in the skies over Pennsylvania and Ohio – seen as far as Virginia and Canada – were probably the signs of a meteorite landing near Cleveland on Tuesday morning, according to the National Weather Service and scientists.
Rattled residents dialed 911, and local emergency officials called the NWS wondering “what the heck?” at about 9 a.m. ET (1300 GMT), said Bill Modzelewski, an NWS meteorologist in Pittsburgh.
“We’re receiving reports across western Pennsylvania and eastern Ohio of a loud boom and a fireball in the sky. Our satellite data suggest it was possibly a meteor entering the atmosphere,” the NWS posted online.
Laurence Garvie, a research professor and curator of the Buseck Center for Meteorite Studies at Arizona State University, said the likely landing spot was Medina, about 40 miles southwest of Cleveland, where meteorite hunters lucky enough to locate the wreckage will likely find lots of little black rocks.
The booming sound was when the space object broke the sound barrier at a speed somewhere between 25,000 and 160,000 miles per hour, according to Garvie. The American Meteor Society received more than 100 reports of sightings of the fireball, according to the online site EarthSky.
“I’ve been getting calls and texts all morning. This is very exciting for us,” Garvie said. “They may just look like black stones on the ground, but you can actually hold something older than the Earth. Something from outer space. And we can learn new things from them.”
(Reporting by Rich McKay in Atlanta; editing by Donna Bryson)
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