O n Sunday, April 24, people from Maine to Long Island reported everything from UFOs to missiles in the sky around 7:45 in the evening. Having ruled out a plane crash, a Federal Aviation Administration spokeswoman fingered the Lyrid meteor shower - a typically weak annual display that peaked days earlier - as the likely culprit. She said the "shower sparked a flurry of frantic phone calls to police departments across New England." Accounts of an object's color, direction, or time, can be inconsistent, and leave the impression that multiple objects have appeared. But like others familiar with such sightings, I knew the reports likely originated from a single event. Witnesses calling the National Weather Service in Taunton, and the personnel who field those calls, tend to be more experienced skywatchers; thus their early conclusion that this was one fireball high in the atmosphere visible over wide areas. The object appeared too early in the evening, and traveled in the wrong direction, to be a Lyrid. Not associated with any known shower, this was by definition a "sporadic" meteor - possibly a small asteroid 5 or 10 feet across. To my knowledge, if any fragments survived the plunge to earth, none have been found. Fragments from other falls can be seen at the Springfield Science Museum's "Rocks from Space" permanent exhibit. What is certain is that this was one dazzling sight. "It was such a weird thing," said Elizabeth Duquette of Longmeadow, who spotted the fireball through her car windshield as she drove south along Main Street in Wilbraham. "The sky was still perfectly light," she said. "The ball was very distinct, and bright, bright green, and had a long bright white tail." Her view - limited by roadside trees - lasted only a few seconds. "If I had looked down to change my radio, I might have missed it," she said.
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