The National Meteor Association received more than 118 reports from Utah, Idaho, Wyoming, Montana and even as far as Canada about a bright green, flaming object seen hurtling overhead on the night of Saturday, May 3.
Jason Trump is a NASA solar system ambassador and education programs supervisor at the Clark Planetarium.
“So a meteor is what we call the streak of light, the phenomenon of an object from space coming through the atmosphere of the Earth,” said Trump. "It gets very, very hot. It lights up, it makes a streak across the sky. That's what scientists call a meteor, which a lot of us just, you know, call it a shooting star. When you get a really large meteor that that's really bright, we call that a fireball.”
Once a meteor hits the ground and is recovered, it is called a meteorite.
Trump added the object’s striking green color when it’s hurtling is no cause for alarm, only an indication of its mineral composition, likely involving magnesium and nickel.
He said based on the current data, it likely didn't land in Utah, probably somewhere in Idaho or Oregon.
“It seems likely that this object was actually traveling from the east to the west, and it was a little bit north of Utah," he said.
Discerning its trajectory may be only half the battle though. Trump said “it's hard to say whether something is going to be recovered or not,” as its prospective location could pose a whole new array of challenges.
“Last time that something landed in the Salt Lake City area was actually in August of 2022. And this is called the Salt Lake City meteorite,” said Trump. “And the convenient thing is that it actually landed in the areas around the Great Salt Lake, where it's very easy to spot a rock on the salt in the sand that's there.”
That might not be the case with this recent meteor. Trump said due to the geography of the Rocky Mountain region, it's very possible that if something did reach the ground, it would be difficult to recover and identify.
“We're just not sure at this point. To put it in perspective, the one that was found in Salt Lake City in 2022 was maybe a little bit bigger than a baseball,” he said. “The only thing that that we might expect damage wise, is if it exploded, which is typical for it to kind of explode and fragment above the surface at some point, and that can cause, you know, a loud noise, potentially cause a little bit of damage in that regard.”
Regarding the potential risk of objects from space, Trump said our concern is best spent not on natural phenomena, but those of a human-made variety.
“I would say, as space continues to become more commercialized, and as we continue to launch more things up there, that's actually a bigger danger than the natural objects," he explained.
Seeing meteors won't be an uncommon occurrence this summer. The Perseids meteor shower, the largest one of the year, will be taking place in mid-August and Utah is an ideal place to view it.
“Utah actually has incredible dark skies, as far as compared to, you know, the grass United States and even the entire world,” said Trump. “We have some really incredible night skies in Utah. So go somewhere that's that's dark, go away from the city lights and go and explore that.”
Clark Planetarium is hosting their next monthly star party on May 30.
“And also, just keeping in mind that if people are curious about meteorites, we do have free exhibits at the Clark Planetarium," Trump said. "We're open seven days a week, and part of our exhibit hall actually does have a lot of information about meteorites"
