‘Scary' Fireball Seen Shooting Across the Sky Confirmed as Meteor That Exploded with the Force of 20 Tons of TNT: See the Video
A NASA expert confirmed to PEOPLE that the object was a meteor, which is a streak of light caused by a small space rock burning up after entering Earth's atmosphere
'It disintegrated 27 miles above West Forest, Georgia, unleashing an energy of about 20 tons of TNT,' NASA saidThe 'scary' fireball that witnesses saw shooting across the sky in southeastern U.S. states on Thursday, June 26, has been identified.
Bill Cooke, NASA's Meteoroid Environment Office lead, confirmed to PEOPLE that the moving object was a meteor — a streak of light caused by a small space rock burning up after entering Earth's atmosphere.
'The meteor was first seen at an altitude of 48 miles above the town of Oxford, Georgia, moving southwest at 30,000 miles per hour,' Cooke said in a statement, adding that his team analyzed eyewitness accounts and camera, satellite, infrasound and doppler weather radar data.
'It disintegrated 27 miles above West Forest, Georgia, unleashing an energy of about 20 tons of TNT. The resulting pressure wave propagated to the ground, creating booms heard by many in that area,' Cooke continued.
He added in the statement that the meteor was produced by an asteroidal fragment that was 3 feet in diameter and weighed more than a ton.
CBS Mornings reported that at least 20 fireball events have been tracked worldwide in 2025, per NASA's Center for Near Earth Objects Studies.
Georgia resident Melanie Whitlock told Atlanta news station WSB-TV that feeling the meteor's sonic boom 'was really, really scary.'
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Her daughter, Amber Hudson, also recalled to the outlet, 'I was even shaking, like, back and forth, and then I was just hearing like the banging sound or whatever, and even a water bottle fell off my nightstand.'
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