NASA Confirms Meteor Nearly Struck New York City After Claims People Heard A Sonic Boom
Residents across New York City and New Jersey claimed they heard a loud boom early Tuesday. Turns out that boom may have been the result of a meteorite passing.
NASA claims a bright meteor zoomed across the states when a loud explosion was heard. The meteor disintegrated about 29 miles above the Statue of Liberty.
Although the space agency can't be certain the loud sound was directly linked to the fireball, they did confirm that a very bright meteor was spotted over the city at around 11:17 a.m. Tuesday.
NASA Meteor watch claimed that — based on reports from the American Meteor Society and eyewitness accounts — the fireball was moving at a high-speed rate of 34,000 miles per hour, descending at a steep 18 degrees from vertical, passing over the Statue of Liberty before burning out.
The meteor watch also confirmed that no other meteors were produced by the event, and that there happened to be military activity in the area during the time the fireball became visible — which could also be the cause of reported shaking and a loud boom.
"Heard it from a boat on the Hudson off midtown Manhattan. Sounded like a canon might have been fired and felt a bit of a shockwave even," a Facebook user commented. "Felt it in Tinton Falls, NJ. Thought it was thunder. Windows shook," a second penned.
Local military weighed in on the phenomenon — but didn't have much information to give. "We have nothing significant to report at this time," a spokeswoman from joint base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst stated, per 'NJ.com.'
Although the calendar showed Tuesday's training activities involved rotary canons, rocket fire, and .50 caliber weapons that may cause "moderate" noise, no "high noise" activities were listed for that morning.
Little Egg Harbor Township reported Warren Grove range would be conducting activity between 10 and 11 a.m., however, it's unknown whether those sound waves could travel as far as Bergen and Passaic Counties in northern New Jersey.
NASA believes the boom could be related to the meteor speeding through the atmosphere, resulting in a sonic boom when it zipped through the sky, as there is no indication that the space matter crashed into any other surface.
