What did I see last night?

[davincivixen]

I live in a rural area south of Buffalo NY. Last night at 8:30pm EST I saw a bright light streaking through the sky with a bright blue tail. I was reading that this is probably from the Geminid Meteor Showers, however, what I saw was about 40 feet off the ground before it disappeared. It was lit for about 5-10 seconds. I thought I was seeing things, but my dog stopped dead in her tracks when she saw it also. Would this have been from the meteor shower or something else?

 

[harmonicaman]

How were you able to determine that it was only 40 feet above the ground?

 

[davincivixen]

It passed between a group of trees and myself. The largest tree in the group is approximately 50 feet tall. Judging by where I saw it, I determined it was approximately 40 feet from the ground. Also, my dog saw the same thing. She doesn't walk around looking up at the sky very much. From the distance we were from the object, it was in her line of sight as well as mine.

 

[harmonicaman]

I agree Eddie; if what he observed was really only "40 feet" above the ground, then I would suggest that it was a fireworks or something other than a meteor.<br /><br />I think it's probably a case of visual perspective error due to the brightness of the object; but the Geminids don't usually have "Blue" tails as they normally have high iron content and tend to burn yellow; so I dunno...<br />

 

[spacester]

<font color="orange">"what I saw was about 40 feet off the ground before it disappeared." </font><br /><br /><font color="yellow">What do you mean by this statement? </font><br /><br />Gee whiz SG, is that such a difficult sentence to parse? Which word is confusing you?<br /><br />What do you mean by your ambiguous question? <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

 

[impact9]

It was higher than 40 feet I'm sure. <br /><br />Like when the Sun rises, the Sun appears to be a few feet off the ground. At the same time someone "closer" to the Sun would see the Sun higher in the sky. The meteor appeared closer since it was very bright. But you can bet it was several miles up and away since it starts burning up soon as it enters the atmosphere some 350+ miles up.<br /><br />On the other hand there have been several video taped cases where a large meteor made it very close to ground. Casting noticeable shadows and producing a wizzing/searing/booming sound during descent. <br /><br />Either way your pretty lucky to see it. Congrats!