'Where did it land?': Doorbell camera captures meteor over Rocky Mountain House
A doorbell camera in Rocky Mountain House captured a meteor flying through the sky Tuesday night.
People in Leduc, New Sarepta and south Edmonton also reported seeing a flash in the sky and hearing a loud boom. At first, due to the freezing rain warning in effect for many parts of Alberta, people thought the flash of light and loud noise could potentially be thunder and lightning.
Some even reported that their houses shook from the booming sound.
CTV News Edmonton meteorologist Josh Classen said no lightning was detected in the area.
"Based on what we know, it looks like it's a fire ball from the entry of a space rock, which we sometimes call a meteoroid coming through the atmosphere," said University of Alberta Professor of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, Chris Herd.
Kaitlyn Kostyniuk's doorbell camera on her home in Rocky Mountain House captured the meteor flying by.
"I heard a rumbling, it sounded like a semi-truck slowing down and I was like that's pretty weird because we're pretty far away from any traffic noise," she said.
Kostyniuk said she didn't think much of it until her phone lit up saying there was motion detected on the front porch camera.
"Sure enough I open up the app and I see a big ball of light flashing across the sky."
The loud bang that accompanied the flash of light was a sonic boom from the meteor, according to Herd.
"The loud boom is not typical, it doesn't happen all that often. In this case, it suggests the rock was of some particular size, we don't even have an estimate at that yet," he said.
"It is a sonic boom basically, it's the result of the rock slowing down really quickly in the atmosphere. That's also what causes the light."
Herd says seeing a meteor is uncommon, but hearing the sonic boom from it passing through the atmosphere is even more rare.
"It suggests that it was larger than the size of a pebble sort of thing, something bigger than that, that had more energy," said Herd.
He pointed out videos of the meteor can be uploaded to the American Meteor Society so they can further triangulate where potential meteorites may have ended up.
"There could be meteorites on the ground," said Herd. "We don't really know the area so we can't really narrow that down."
Herd asks anyone who finds a meteorite to contact the University of Alberta because anything that recently arrived from space has significant scientific value.
"We tend to encourage people not to touch them with their hands. Not that there's anything dangerous about them, but the more sort of pristine, the more sort of uncontaminated, even from finger grease things like that, the better that we can understand what the intrinsic properties of the rock are," he said.
Kostyniuk said she shared her video online in the hopes of finding out what happened to the meteor.
"I want to know, did it land? Where did it land? Like, I'm so excited," said Kostyniuk.
CTVNews.ca Top Stories
BREAKING Honda to get up to $5B in govt help for EV battery, assembly plants
Honda is set to build an electric vehicle battery plant next to its Alliston, Ont., assembly plant, which it is retooling to produce fully electric vehicles, all part of a $15-billion project that is expected to include up to $5 billion in public money.
BREAKING New York appeals court overturns Harvey Weinstein's 2020 rape conviction from landmark #MeToo trial
New York’s highest court on Thursday overturned Harvey Weinstein’s 2020 rape conviction, finding the judge at the landmark #MeToo trial prejudiced the ex-movie mogul with improper rulings, including a decision to let women testify about allegations that weren’t part of the case.
Residents of northern Alberta First Nation told to shelter in place
Residents of John D'Or Prairie, a community on the Little Red River Cree Nation in northern Alberta, were told to take shelter Thursday morning during a police operation.
Secret $70M Lotto Max winners break their silence
During a special winner celebration near their hometown, Doug and Enid shared the story of how they discovered they were holding a Lotto Max ticket worth $70 million and how they kept this huge secret for so long.
Remains from a mother-daughter cold case were found nearly 24 years later, after a deathbed confession from the suspect
A West Virginia father is getting some sense of closure after authorities found the remains of his young daughter and her mother following a deathbed confession from the man believed to have fatally shot them nearly two decades ago.
Monthly earnings rise, payroll employment falls: jobs report
The number of vacant jobs in Canada increased in February, while monthly payroll employment decreased in food services, manufacturing, and retail trade, among other sectors.
Doctors say capital gains tax changes will jeopardize their retirement. Is that true?
The Canadian Medical Association asserts the Liberals' proposed changes to capital gains taxation will put doctors' retirement savings in jeopardy, but some financial experts insist incorporated professionals are not as doomed as they say they are.
Something in the water? Canadian family latest to spot elusive 'Loch Ness Monster'
For centuries, people have wondered what, if anything, might be lurking beneath the surface of Loch Ness in Scotland. When Canadian couple Parry Malm and Shannon Wiseman visited the Scottish highlands earlier this month with their two children, they didn’t expect to become part of the mystery.
Metro Vancouver mayors call for serial killer Robert Pickton to be denied parole
A dozen mayors from around Metro Vancouver say federal Attorney General and Justice Minister Arif Virani should deny parole for notorious B.C. serial killer Robert Pickton, and reassess the parole and sentencing system for 'prolific offenders and mass murderers.'