On Sept.4, Matthew Dominick, a NASA Astronaut and commander of NASA’s SpaceX Crew-8 mission, shared timelapse footage showing a meteor exploding in the night sky. He captured the photos from the International Space Station as it passed over Cairo, Egypt.
Dominick said that the meteor exploded on 2 September 2024 at 20:12:20 GMT, based on the clock in the camera, which may be off by 30 seconds or so on either side.
On his X handler, Dominick shared, “I showed this to a couple of friends yesterday to see what they thought. They both thought it was a meteor exploding in the atmosphere – a rather bright one called a bolide.”
“Timelapse is slowed to one frame per second for you to see it streaking and then exploding.”
I showed this to a couple of friends yesterday to see what they thought. They both thought it was a meteor exploding in the atmosphere – a rather bright one called a bolide. Timelapse is slowed down to one frame per second for you to see it streaking and then exploding.
If you… pic.twitter.com/tn2KmWgnoE
— Matthew Dominick (@dominickmatthew) September 3, 2024
“If you know about these types of meteors, please chime in. I am curious to know more.”
Dominick shared two versions of the timelapse. The following post is a longer and faster frame-rate version of the timelapse.
Here is a longer and faster frame rate version of the timelapse. I think it is interesting to compare the size of the bolide blast to other objects in view like the mediterranean, Cairo, or lightning strikes. pic.twitter.com/oQZnfAeVqg
— Matthew Dominick (@dominickmatthew) September 3, 2024
According to him, it’s interesting to compare the size of the bolide blast to other objects in view, such as the Mediterranean, Cairo, or lightning strikes.
The timelapse was set up over Northern Africa, where it was very dark with lightning. He got greedy with ISO (25600), and when the timelapse got to Cairo, the cities were overexposed because he wanted the Milky Way Core. After reviewing the shots later, he found the bolide.
