On January 21st at 6:45am a fireball appeared in the sky over Wisconsin. A large meteor alert was issued by the International Meteor Organization (IMO).
The IMO claims they received over 100 reports of the sky event. And that there were thousands of sightings reported in Wisconsin, Iowa, Illinois, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri and Nebraska.
The Wisconsin reports of a flaming object were mainly from the eastern part of the state. The fiery meteor received more attention because it appeared over densely populated areas and large cities like Chicago, and Milwaukee.
The event was captured by a rooftop camera at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Beautiful! Long-lasting #Meteor streaked across the sky @UWMadison this morning. This is from the rooftop of the @UW_AOS building around 6:48 am. pic.twitter.com/suC9SzI70z
— Max Tsaparis (@MaxTsaparis) January 20, 2022
Large meteor alert investigation
UWM astronomy professor James Lattis claims since the fireball was moving in a southwesterly direction it was likely a meteoroid. Typically, space junk travels to the east.
Lattis said it’s common to see meteors in the early morning hours in this region. The Midwest faces forward in the earth’s orbit around the sun.
