GREENVILLE, SC (WYFF) - The National Weather Service and emergency dispatchers from across the
Upstate say they got numerous calls overnight from people who heard a
loud explosion that was followed by lights streaking across the sky.
NWS
staffers said they got a call from Greenville police around 2:00 a.m.
They said after they started getting calls, they checked the security
camera at the National Weather Service and saw a faint, barely
recognizable flash of light at 1:42 a.m.
A NWS representative said it may have been a meteor, but that his agency does not investigate these events.
NASA would be the source to confirm meteor activity. The agency has not yet returned a call.
In
Spartanburg County alone, dispatchers took about 75 calls, and reports
are coming in from as far away as Lexington, N.C. and Carrollton, Ga.
Firefighters
with the Reidville fire department in Spartanburg County witnessed the
light show first hand. They said it happened at about 1:55 a.m.
Retired
astronomer Doug Gegen did not see the light in the sky, but he said
based on what he is hearing from everybody, it sounds like it was an
unusual meteor.
"People saw a lot of lights in the sky, but what
does that mean really? Well, it means that probably there was some kind
of thing happening that was out of the ordinary," said Gegen.
Gegen said the event was different than annual meteor showers such as the Leonids, which peak every November.
Copyright 2012 WIS. All rights reserved.
Simulated image of a meteorite
All content © Copyright 2000 - 2012 WorldNow and WISTV, a Raycom Media Station. 