Thursday July 10, 2014 provided some excitement for many throughout south-eastern Australia as a fireball raced across the nighttime sky. Although many questioned its origin, it was quickly discovered that rubble from a Russian rocket launching a weather satellite was the culprit.
NASA issued an alert to announce the flying rubble during the launch, reports The Sydney Morning Herald. It appears that the "main" portion of the third-stage object landed in the ocean near Brisbane. Dr. Nick Lomb, a curator of astronomy at the Sydney Observatory, explains that debris flying off of rockets during launches is a normal phenomenon. It was the bright light contrasted with the night sky that brought about an exciting factor.
According to TIME, the fireball was travelling at rough speeds of 18,000 miles per hour as it came crashing across Melbourne. It was originally assumed that the debris was a meteor, and the hashtag #meteor quickly began to trend on Twitter.