A fireball from an asteroid streaks across the skies above Andalucia

A fireball that most likely came from an asteroid crossed the Andalusian sky on Monday night, according to the MeteoroSMA Fireball and Meteor Detection Network.

The University of Malaga network and the Malaga Astronomy Society reported that at 9.59 pm 14 February “a spectacular fireball disintegrated over the province of Jaén.”

It was recorded on video by the observatory stations at Dehesa San Francisco in Huelva, El Viso in Cordoba and the El Torcal observatory in Malaga. In addition, an image was captured by the Bootes-2 observatory which is part of the Bootes Global Network. Its spectrum was also obtained which will allow for its composition to be determined.

The fireball began to glow at a height of 84 kilometres and travelled a distance of some 45 kilometres in a southeasterly direction at an average speed of 45,000 kilometres per hour over the Sierra Mágina Natural Park in Jaén. It burned up at an altitude of 51 kilometres.

The calculated orbit suggests that the parent body was an asteroid, according to the MeteoroSMA network.