WATCH: ‘Fireball’ illuminates sky over Florida

FLORIDA: In a remarkable incident, a huge meteor measuring about 16 feet in diameter illuminated skies over Florida and the Bahamas on Monday night.

According to the details, the fireball streaked across the sky about 10:19 p.m. Monday and was caught on camera across Florida.

 

The National Weather Service (NWS) of Tampa Bay confirmed the object, which was also spotted in Georgia and the Bahamas, was a meteor.

In a Tweet, NWS said, “Our #GOES-16 Geostationary Lightning Mapper (GLM) appears to have captured the bright meteor as it burned up off the coast.”

 

Some observers theorized the meteor might have been a piece of asteroid 2021 GW4, which passed 12,313 miles from Earth’s surface, but astronomer Jonathan McDowell of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics said the fireball was unrelated to the asteroid.

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