Mysterious ‘fireballs’ noticed over Japan (VIDEOS)

Residents captured footage of brilliant lights streaking throughout the evening sky in southern Japan

Strange fireball-like objects have been seen flying over Japan’s Okinawa Prefecture on Wednesday evening, in accordance with native news reviews, with a number of eyewitnesses taking to social media to share clips of the spectacle. 

A video captured by an NHK reporter round 8:30pm native time reveals the objects blazing via the sky close to Naha City in Japan’s southernmost area. The journalist stated they have been “surprised” by the sighting, noting “At first, I thought they were fireworks, but I didn’t hear any sound and they moved in a straight line.”

The Ishigakijima Astronomical Observatory, situated in Ishigaki City on the Okinawa island chain, later confirmed that it noticed a “streak of light” within the sky north of the power at 8:33pm on Wednesday. 

Numerous locals additionally filmed the fireballs and uploaded the footage on-line, with one video created by the Ryukyu Shimpo newspaper compiling a collection of clips shared by residents. On social media, some observers speculated the lights have been items of a meteor or shooting stars.

However, whereas the objects have but to be recognized definitively, the Ishigakijima observatory provided a believable clarification, noting that particles from a Chinese rocket launched final November was anticipated to re-enter Earth’s ambiance on the evening of May 10. The observatory predicted the house junk would “pass directly over the main island of Okinawa,” or simply north of it, NHK added.

“Fireballs and meteorites can be expected to hit the Earth vertically or obliquely, but debris from satellites and rockets are orbiting the Earth,” the observatory stated. “So it’s possible that [the debris] will look like this because it’s going to slowly plunge in, near parallel to the Earth, and burn up over a long period of time.”