Par
Lucie Fraisse
Published on
Oct 9, 2024 at 1:46 p.m.
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You may have seen her this morning. And despite the early hour, you did not dream: a ball of fire did indeed cross the sky of Toulouse, around 7:15 a.m. this Wednesday, October 9, 2024.
Photographed by a camera at the Midi-Pyrénées observatory
A fireball that was identified by the Fripon network (Fireball Recovery and InterPlanetary Observation Network), an international network that aims to trace the origin of flows of extraterrestrial material falling on Earth.
The fireball was identified by the camera installed at the Midi-Pyrénées observatory, at the CNRS, in Toulouse. Automatic cameras installed in Bizanet in Aude and Hyères in Var also captured his image.
A meteoroid or fireball
“It is undoubtedly of a meteoroid that disintegrated by entering the atmosphere, explains Benjamin Peter, journalist responsible for space news at Cité de l’espace. This is not a rare event: every day, 30 tons of dust and materials enter the Earth’s atmosphere. »
The ball of fire seen this morning in the sky of Toulouse can also be called a bolide: its luminosity was in fact similar to that of the planet Venus, which means that it was visible to the naked eye.
Related to the Draconids?
“The Draconids, a shower of shooting stars, experienced their peak of activity last night,” explains Benjamin Peter. This car may be linked to it. »
Bolide, fireball, meteoroid… Whatever the scientific name given to the phenomenon, if you observe it in the Toulouse sky, do not hesitate to report it, even if your knowledge of astronomy is absolutely zero.
The Vigie-ciel site, a participatory science program backed by the Fripon program and accessible to all, makes it possible to collect data on these phenomena.
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