PORTLAND, Maine, May 17 (UPI) — An officer in Portland, Maine, captured video of a fireball lighting up the early morning sky over New England.
“You never know what you are going to see on duty. Sgt. Farris was looking for speeders while parked in front of the central fire station and was able to observe some visitors ‘from away’ … far away,” the Portland Police Department wrote in a humorous statement on Facebook. “The meteor (or alien spaceship) was caught on camera at approximately 0050 hours. Let’s hope the visitors are friendly. They could just be some of Stephen King’s friends on there way to visit him. Whomever they are I’m sure we could win them over with a whoopie pie.”
Another officer, identified as Hults, was “apparently … amazed” after exclaiming “Oh my God!” in the video, the police department wrote.
Fireballs are usually bigger and brighter “shooting stars” or meteors. The illumination occurs when large debris burns up as it enters Earth’s atmosphere.
More than 170 people reported seeing the fireball.
“The fireball was seen primarily from Maine but witnesses from Vermont, New Hampshire, New Jersey, Massachusetts, New York, Rhode Island, Pennsylvania, Connecticut, Ontario (Canada) and Québec (Canada) also reported the event,” the American Meteor Society wrote in a statement.