Fireball seen over Madrid

Yahoo (AFP) ^ | Fri Jan 28,10:47 AM ET

[Thinkin' Gal]

Fireball seen over Madrid

Fri Jan 28,10:47 AM ET

MADRID (AFP) - Residents of the area near Madrid airport reported seeing a ball of fire explode and disintregrate in skies over the Spanish capital overnight, security services said.

Emergency services received telephone calls about 10:30 pm (2130 GMT) Thursday reporting the object, described by some callers as looking like a meteorite, which was seen exploding and disintegrating.

Subway employee Jose Antonio Lopez told EFE news agency that when he went home from work, some 50 kilometres (30 miles) from the capital, he saw a "huge, very red incandescent ball giving off a huge flash then disappeared after a few seconds."

"It was a mass of red fire falling vertically," he said, suggesting it could have been a meteorite.

[AmericanChef]

Maybe it's one of those UFOs from Iran...

[Deetes]

Didn't something like this happen right before the earthquake and tsunami in Indonesia ?

[FourtySeven]

The sky is falling! Women/minorities hardest hit.

[Walkingfeather]

ssshhhhhhh dont tell them that.

[Oberon]

"It was a mass of red fire falling vertically," he said, suggesting it could have been a meteorite.

Nope. Couldn't have been. It's definitionally impossible.

(Which makes me something of a geek, I'll admit.)

[dfwgator]

Goodness gracious.

[SlowBoat407]

True. They arc in, typically at a rather shallow angle.

[exnavychick]

I guess that makes me one, too, because I thought almost the exact same thing when I read that line. :)

[AppyPappy]

I see a strange host around the sun

[Deetes]

ROFLOL!!!!

[evets]

[SlowBoat407]

However, if the viewer were exactly uprange of the object, it could have appeared to come in vertically when it was actually passing directly overhead on its way in.

[BibChr]

[F16Fighter]

"So ya like fire, Scarecrow??"

[WestTexasWend]

Can't be the French Airbus A380...it hasn't left the ground yet.

[Thinkin' Gal]

"It was a mass of red fire falling vertically,"

Yeah, but in which direction?

[exnavychick]

LOL! That's why I'd never hack it as a scientist...I just overlooked the obvious!

Thanks for smacking me with some much needed perspective. :)

[Oberon]

Boat, the issue isn't how vertical its path was...the issue is that it was falling at all. Meteorites don't fall.

[BobS]

Was that near the "caves"- those endless bars in the walls of the plaza major?