A huge ball of fire was seen falling from the sky and crashing on Wednesday in the northwestern Chinese city of Yushu. In a video of the incident shared on YouTube, a huge fireball can be seen flashing across the sky, illuminating the dark sky over southern China.
In several films captured by locals, a fireball, suspected as a meteor, illuminates the sky and falls in Nanggian County in northwest China’s Qinghai Province. Locals reported hearing loud bangs and the incident is said to have occurred at 7 a.m. on December 23.
According to a report by Daily mail, it is not yet clear what the burning sphere is, but local media suggest the unidentified object could be a bright meteor. Some experts also suggest that the object was a fireball, an extremely bright meteor. The chief writer of the Chinese scientific site Guokr, Yu Jun, while talking to the media, said that he looked like a fireball. Some meteorite fragments may have escaped somewhere around the area.
Fortunately, no causalities were reported.
According to NASA, more than 50,000 meteorites have been found on Earth since December 19. Meteorites often fly past the Earth, but it is rare to see them fall to the surface.
Watch the amazing video here:
Many went on social media to share photos and videos of the unusual phenomenon. Dan Ba, a local who witnessed the incident while taking his child to school, said the car started like a small ball and, after three minutes, became big and shiny.
A passenger traveling from Xi’an to Lhasa recorded the incident on the plane.
Journalist Mete Sohtaoglu also shared the video of the incident on Twitter.
A huge fireball was seen flashing across the sky and collapsing in a southern county #ChinaThe pots taken by the astonished locals show an unidentified object exploding in a burning sphere as it is thrown at a rapid speed toward Earth. pic.twitter.com/DmAQDhkZ7G– Mete Sohtaoğlu (@metesohtaoglu) December 23, 2020
The 18-second long clip has been viewed over 1000 times.
“This is a BIG one! A huge fireball seen over China, “wrote a Twitter user.
In one video, the huge fireball gets bigger and brighter as it approaches the ground and you hear loud bangs. Another user pointed out how a similar incident occurred in Alabama on the same day that a meteor shone brightly in the sky. He went on Twitter to explain further.
Today, two strange and sensational events took place in Qinghai China and Marshall County Alabama USA. A Meteor makes a LANDFALL in qinghai while in Alabama a Meteor SHINES in the sky. We will need astrologers to help us make sense of the strange happenings. https://t.co/Csrpk8yuCR— jerryo98 (@jaydchilly) December 23, 2020
China’s earthquake network center confirmed in a tweet that it had recorded the incident and said a suspicious car had landed near the border between Nangqian County and Yusu County at 7:25 a.m.
A super bright fireball stunned people living in western Qinghai and eastern Tibet in China at 7:23 this morning! pic.twitter.com/DskUwtBXuH– Renjiang Xie (Jason) Xie Renjiang (@ JasonXie1977) December 23, 2020