AIKEN – You weren’t imagining things if you heard a loud boom between 2 and 3 a.m. this morning.
Dr. Gary Senn, director of the Dupont Planetarium in the Ruth Patrick Science Education Center at USC Aiken, says it was a large meteor, technically called a bolide.
“We’ve had a couple of calls this morning from people,” he said. “It seems like a few people were outside and actually saw the thing itself. Others reported hearing the sound.”
He said people have reported the sound to be like a clap of thunder. Sightings were of a large fireball in the sky.
About the same time as the boom was heard, a brief power outage occurred at the Medical College of Georgia Hospital at 2:41 a.m., according to hospital officials. However, spokeswoman Deborah Humphrey said there is no evidence it had anything to do with the boom.
“It appears to be coincidental,” she said.
Dr. Senn said it’s possible the meteor could have struck the ground somewhere in the area, but it all depends on whether it exploded upon entering the atmosphere – which could have caused the loud boom – or whether it hit at an angle that left it intact.
If it stayed intact, he said the loud sound people heard could have been that of a sonic boom.
“It’s very rare, but occasionally if a large enough bolide enters at the right angle it can create a sonic boom,” he said.
Dr. Senn said sightings of large fireballs in the sky are somewhat rare, but have occurred before in the Augusta area.
He said those who saw or heard this morning’s fireball are asked to visit the Web site www.amsmeteors.org and file a fireball sighting report. From there, the American Meteor Society will use the information to help it determine where the meteor might have collided, should it have survived the entry into the atmosphere. The report can be found on the site by clicking on “fireball sightings” and then scrolling to the bottom to the link “fireball reporting form.”
Reach Preston Sparks at (803) 648-1395, ext. 110 or preston.sparks@augustachronicle.co
The Augusta Chronicle ©2010 Morris Communications, LLC. All Rights Reserved.
I, for one, welcome our new Meteor overlords!
It rattled our windows and our dogs went nuts. We thought it was an earthquake!
I slept right through it.
Ditto Greenjacket! We thought someone was trying to bust down the door or something!
Yesterday between 5-6pm . We were standing outside and heard a loud boom also. It was like a boom or something. we didnt see anything. But it was weird . This was in the mcbean area.
I was in the house and I heard the sonic boom, clearly a sonic boom it has a distinct sound. The house shook and I thought the base here was testing a new aircraft. I am in Evans,GA. I did look outside afterward and noticed clouds of some formation coming from outside the Stratford subdivision on Hardy Mcmanus. Don't know if it was realated. The wind seemed to be blowing at a fast paced this is why the cloud formation seemed so perplexing.
no, it is not true it hit in a section of Augusta and made two million dollars worth of improvements...just a rumor.
It woke me up out of my sleep because it made my whole house shake. All I can say is that it was scary.
Good Morning, My name is Ruben Garcia http://www.mr-meteorite.net and I work with a team of Professional Meteorite hunters. We just returned from a successful meteorite recovery effort in West, Texas. We work closely with Universities, Museums and Scientists to recover meteorites for study and teaching purposes. Having just heard of the fireball near Augusta we are very interested in knowing if anyone has reported meteorites hitting the gound, broken windows, cracked winshields, etc... Any additiional information that you can provide us with would be appeciated. Thanks, meteoritemall@yahoo.com
mr-meteorite, sorry everyone in augusta was worried about trees falling, no time to sweat a meteorite !!
I heard the boom and thougt hearing thunder was rather odd! Glad to know the reason for this.
i heard it...scared the crap out of me.
actually i thought it was the sound of our economy collapsing.
The boom and vibration woke me up out of a dead sleep near Greenbrier/Evans. I thought it was thunder as well and then realized that the sky was clear.
My husband and I heard something, but after going outside there was no smoke or fire and that was after riding around looking for it and dispatch had no clue as to what it was either. We live out in Aiken.
lmulrain1 - what base? Ft. Gordon? not too many supersonic aircraft there pal. geeze! nice comment though...it was probably hypersonic swamp gas coming from that area. if i were you i would stay up all night for the next 5 nights and try to video tape it. good luck!
i think i found it....standby....wait.
nope....dog poop. sorry! the hunt continues.
LOL. Could it be any leftover debris from the two satellites (one American and one Russian) that collided with each other not too long ago? Anyway, I woke up, but I had no idea what woke me up, it must have stopped the light and noise by the time I became aware, as I was in deep sleep. I am in 30906. Did anyone else notice anything unusual in my area?
it was probably commissioner jerry brigham falling down
My team of meteorite hunters and I will pay for any meteorites recovered from this fireball. If you have found a newly fallen meteorite in your yard, on your roof, etc... contact me. These meteorites will probably be black (with a burned appearence) on the exterior and a white interior.
My email
Meteoritemall@yahoo.com
i heard it in 30907 around 2something in the morning. i thought it was thunder but then i realized my whole house was shaking and dont remember weather.com saying it would rain this week. i got freaked out but fell right back to sleep!
I awoke this at about 3:00 A.M. this morning wringing wet speaking in an unknown tongue.We are living in the last days and the lord is going to give the infidels an asbestos body to burn in for eternity. Even if they are beheaded first! chat la duk uhl al kir lir loene lines li'lere lirreor
Oh my god....That hunk of chocolate wrapped in tin foil that I ate last night was Ex lax
LOL Sarg!
I was up from 1:00 am until 4:00am on Mar.20,2009 and I heard a boom sounding like an explosion. At the time of the incident I was in Beech Island, SC 29842. At first I thought It was a transformer blown, because we lost power for about 2 minutes.
I heard the boom sometime between 2 and 3 a.m. My dog thought it was thunder and proceeded to shake the bed so badly, I couldn't tell you if the house was shaking or not!! I am in the 30815 area.
i heard the boom around 2:45 a.m.sound like someone had a bad accident,it vibrated the house.i was waiting to hear sirens,but fell asleep.i'm in the 30904 area
I heeard it over in Martinez, thought they were blasting again out at the old quarry. Shook the house flash of light like lightning and a defening cracking sound.
Something woke me up about that time, but we have so many people visiting at the house next door 24/7 with loud booming cars, I figured it was just one of the less noisy ones sliding around the corner real quick and went back to sleep without noting the exact time. Apparently it was louder than boom boom cars in areas possibly closer to the source of the sound. I'm reading reports from here to Alpharetta Georgia (170 miles NW of here). As heavily populated as that area is (north of Atlanta) maybe there is a security camera with video or still picture of it!
I heard... and saw it... it WAS a meteorite..
I didnt heard no boom,put i heard sirens though. This was about 12:00-1:00. So i fell back to sleep and woke up at 6:00 to turn on the news. And they sayed there was a big boom. My question is where did the meteorite hit? Instead thank God hope nobody got hurt.