The detectors of the project SMARTof the Institute of Astrophysics of Andalusia (IAA-CSIC)from the astronomical observatories of Huelva, Seville, Sierra Nevada and La Sagra (Granada), Calar Alto (Almería) and La Hita (Toledo) have recorded the passage of a fireball over Morocco at 61,000 km/hour.
According to the analysis carried out by the astrophysicist Jose Maria Madiedoa researcher at the Instituto de Astrofísica de Andalucía (IAA-CSIC) and director of the SMART project, this fireball was recorded at 3:56 a.m. yesterday, Sunday, and “it came to have a luminosity greater than that of the full Moon”which motivated “numerous people” to be able to observe the phenomenon from Spain, echoing it on social networks.
The calculations carried out by Madiedo show that the rock that caused this phenomenon came from an asteroid and entered the Earth’s atmosphere at a speed of about 61,000 kilometers per hour.
The violent friction with the Earth’s atmosphere at this enormous speed caused the surface of the rock (the meteoroid) to heat up to a temperature of several thousand degrees and become incandescent, thus generating a fireball that began at an altitude of about 97.000 km on the town of Ibouhjarene.
From that position he advanced to the southeast and went extinct at an altitude of about 31,000 km on the town of Beni Oukil.