'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
Ottawa public school board, 3 Toronto-area school boards launch lawsuit against social media giants
The Ottawa-Carleton District School Board and three school boards in the Toronto-area have launched legal action against social media giants, accusing them of "disrupting students' fundamental right to education."
Several flight attendants from Pakistan have gone missing after landing in Canada
Multiple flight attendants from Pakistan International Airlines have abandoned their jobs and are believed to have sought asylum in Canada in the past year and a half, a spokesperson for the government-owned airline says.
Tipping is off the table at this Toronto restaurant
A Toronto restaurant introduced a surprising new rule that reduced the cost of a meal and raised the salaries of staff.
Rainfall warnings of up to 90 mm among weather alerts in effect for 7 provinces
Rainfall warnings of up to 90 millimetres, air quality advisories and other alerts have been issued for seven Canadian provinces, according to the latest forecasts.
King Charles calls for acts of friendship in first public remarks since Kate's cancer diagnosis
King Charles III gave public remarks for Maundy Thursday, addressing the importance of acts of friendship, following his and Catherine, Princess of Wales’ cancer diagnoses.
A Nigerian woman reviewed some tomato puree online. Now she faces jail
A Nigerian woman who wrote an online review of a can of tomato puree is facing imprisonment after its manufacturer accused her of making a “malicious allegation” that damaged its business.
Ukrainian child asylum seekers in St. John’s get class of their own
Roughly 50 children will gathered in a St. John’s classroom for the first time on Saturday for unique lessons on Ukrainian language, culture and history.
Donald Trump assails judge and his daughter after gag order in N.Y. hush-money criminal case
Donald Trump lashed out Wednesday at the New York judge who put him under a gag order that bars him from commenting publicly about witnesses, prosecutors, court staff and jurors in his upcoming hush-money criminal trial.
A fight to protect the dignity of Michelangelo's David raises questions about freedom of expression
Michelangelo's David has been a towering figure in Italian culture since its completion in 1504. But in the current era of the quick buck, curators worry the marble statue's religious and political significance is being diminished.