Meteor Streaks Over American East Coast

California doesn't get all the action; The Washington Post is one of many news outlets reporting that the east coast of North America got a good view of a meteor, with more than 300 sightings from Canada to Florida. Did you see it? If so, did you have your dashcam on? Update: 03/23 13:43 GMT by T : The meteor was captured at least by some security cameras, as reported by The Guardian.

i understand that meteors are neat and all..

[wierd_w]

But really now.. I have seen many fall this year driving home from work. One even lasted 5 seconds before burning out, and was brilliant white. (Saw it sometime in February.)

Do people on the coasts just have so much light pollution that anything other than a jumbojet or helicopter with running lights on causes excitement? Seriously, meteors happen all the time. The one that fell over russia was especially large, and had a lot of energy. That's why it was news. This one over the east coast just sounds like your garden variety to me.

What's all the buzz about?

Re:i understand that meteors are neat and all..

[Sperbels]

Because most people never see one like that and don't realize it's fairly common. After the Russian incident, any bolide means THE SKY IS FALLING!! and they click on it. The buzz will die eventually.

Re:Too far

[Endovior]

That'd actually be a good thing, really. I mean, it's short-term terrible about civilian casualties and the destruction of a city and all, but long-term, the investments in space technology and meteor detection would be vastly more positive for everyone in general than any of these other wars have been.

Re:Too far

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, and how many people need to die from lightning before we build an iron dome to protect us from the weather?

Meteor impacts are very low probability events. Just because after thousands of years of human history we now are approaching the technology level to deal with meteors doesn't mean that the risk of meteors has changed. And if you are worried about extinction events, 99.999% of your attention should be focused on the ones that humans would cause (nuclear war, bioweapons release, etc.).