SAN FRANCISCO (KRON) — A mysterious fireball appeared in the sky Thursday evening that was observed above Napa, San Francisco, San Jose, and Santa Cruz. The strange streaking lights had a long tail of debris. Sky watchers wondered if they were looking at an asteroid.
Ryan Stewart, who recorded a video of the lights from Napa, asked if he was looking at space junk or a meteorite. “Either way, very cool firework show!” he told KRON4.
The American Meteor Society said it received 207 reports about a fireball seen over California. The majority of reports were submitted from people in the Bay Area.
“This was not a natural fireball. It was the reentry of a StarLink satellite,” the American Meteor Society confirmed.
On Thursday night, SpaceX launched a Falcon 9 rocket from Vandenberg Space Force Base along California’s coast and sent 23 more SpaceX’s Starlink satellites into a low orbit around Earth.
“Liftoff of the mission from Space Launch Complex 4 East happened at 9:26 p.m. PDT. The rocket deployed 24 of SpaceX’s Starlink V2 Mini broadband internet satellites into low Earth orbit a little more than an hour into the mission,” SpaceX wrote.
Starlink megaconstellation satellites are made of aluminum that transforms into aluminum oxide while burning and “hurtling through Earth’s atmosphere at orbital speeds,” Space.com reported.
A significant amount of orbital debris does not survive severe extreme heating that occurs during reentry, according to NASA.
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