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Alberta, Saskatchewan Fireball Lights Up Prairie Skies (VIDEO)

First Posted: 02/22/2012 10:09 am Updated: 02/22/2012 5:30 pm

SASKATOON - A scientist says the fireball that streaked above Alberta and Saskatchewan on Tuesday is the biggest and brightest recorded on the Prairies in nearly five years.

Alan Hildebrand with the University of Calgary says the asteroid probably shed meteorites as it flew through the night sky.

Cameras in Calgary and central Saskatchewan captured part of its four-second flight that ended near North Battleford about 8:40 p.m.

Witnesses lucky enough to catch a fleeting glimpse went on Twitter to report the multi-hued flash.

Hildebrand says the last fireball to cause such a stir blazed across all three prairie provinces in November 2008.

It's believed that 10-tonne meteor scattered more than 10,000 rock pieces, most of them in farm fields around Buzzard Coulee near Lloydminster.

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SASKATOON - A scientist says the fireball that streaked above Alberta and Saskatchewan on Tuesday is the biggest and brightest recorded on the Prairies in nearly five years.Alan Hildebrand with the Un...
SASKATOON - A scientist says the fireball that streaked above Alberta and Saskatchewan on Tuesday is the biggest and brightest recorded on the Prairies in nearly five years.Alan Hildebrand with the Un...
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HUFFPOST SUPER USER
Skookum1
shooting fish in a barrel is sure relaxing
06:44 PM on 02/22/2012
Well, there WAS a news item last night of a launch of a rocket into the Northern Lights from Point Barrow, pic must be on the web somewhere. They didn't say it's trajectory but it's obvious it couldn't have been into Arctic airspace, unless maybe the Russians are OK with supposedly scientific experiments. Seems most likely it was fired towards Canada/North America. Could be the booms around the North Battleford area were re-entry detonations, to keep the equipment from falling into non-military hands etc What the purposes of this particular launch were was left vague in the report so who knows what they're tinkering with; certainly the aurora are going to be in a state right now given the solar storm underway (those tornadoes on the sun are sumpin' huh?) so probing them right now might have been timely. Still could have been a meteor, though, common enough, it's just the timing in connection with the Point Barrow launch caught my eye....
HUFFPOST SUPER USER
Skookum1
shooting fish in a barrel is sure relaxing
06:51 PM on 02/22/2012
Some experiments you just can't hide, so it seems like if there IS any connection, they're just letting it slide and, as observed, meteors are standard natural phenomena, and there's gonna be secret satellites coming down too as well as the ones they have to warn us about.....

But then there's experiments you CAN hide, or have to....Studies and experiments on the aurora, though, are also associated with HAARP's manifold mysteries just as this launch was (and the lights on the prairies were caused by) - as are also ways to shift the movement of the jet stream and other high-altitude atmospheric effects made possible by Teslan technology that can direct power at a distance etc. What I read on it, I think in Harper's way back when, said that such directional power could be used to heat targeted areas and could be used to manipulate the boundary between the troposphere and the stratosphere so as to divert the jet stream....I guess they don't fully have the handle on it yet, given what we've all been getting in the way of weather, huh?
05:29 PM on 02/22/2012
same saw in US,
but funny it strikes at the exact same place...
02:41 PM on 02/22/2012
Can't wait to start hearing the religious zealots claims of armageddon after seeing this report...the world is ending, it's 2012!
02:04 PM on 02/22/2012
The universe is wondrous! And No God Required.