Astronaut captures meteor explosion over Earth from ISS

NASA astronaut Matthew Dominick, who is currently on the SpaceX Crew-8 mission, captured a remarkable time-lapse video from the International Space Station. The footage shows a bright green fireball, a meteor that exploded in the atmosphere, occurring on September 2 at 8:12 p.m. EDT while the ISS was passing over Cairo, Egypt. Dominick aimed to photograph the Milky Way's Core but unexpectedly recorded the meteor's dramatic entry into Earth's atmosphere. The meteor, classified as a bolide due to its exceptional brightness, created a stunning visual display as it burned up, producing a glow that outshone the stars and moon. Bolides are large meteors that can generate sonic booms and last several seconds, making them particularly captivating to observe. Dominick shared two versions of the time-lapse, one slowed down for detail and another faster version that highlights the brief flash of the meteor. In his social media post, Dominick expressed his excitement about the discovery, noting that friends he showed the footage to immediately recognized it as a meteor explosion. The timelapse consists of 20 individual images taken from the Cupola module of the ISS, showcasing the meteor's fleeting moment against the backdrop of Earth. During his time aboard the ISS, Dominick has been an active photographer, capturing various celestial phenomena, including auroras and other meteors. This incident adds to the growing collection of stunning imagery from space, highlighting the beauty and unpredictability of our universe.