Was Caithness comet space junk or ‘bolide’ meteor? Anya (10) said it was like ‘an alien falling from the sky’
Numerous local reports were received by the Groat of a bright comet seen over Caithness that glowed green and white and left a smoky trail.
An eyewitness contacted the paper saying that around 4.50pm on Friday (January 31) a "bright large falling star" was seen in the sky south of Wick.
They added: "It gradually descended, very bright white like a meteor and broke up over Thrumster House [a stately home close to Wick]."
Maciej Winiarczyk from Wick, who is well-known for pictures of auroras and other celestial phenomena, said it may be a bolide.
“I didn't see it, but from descriptions, it looks like it was a bolide,” he said. Bolide is a term used to describe a large, bright meteor, or a fireball that explodes in the Earth's atmosphere. Bolides are often spectacular enough to be seen from a wide area. The green tinge to the fireball is also commonly seen in bolide meteors.
Another witness, living in Wick, said: “I saw something very similar. I was sitting in the car at Poundstretcher looking north and saw a bright light falling from the sky – looked like it fell around the North School [now Noss Primary School] area or beyond.”
Ann Miller said that her 10-year-old daughter Anya managed to get a photo of the strange phenomenon. “The photo Anya captured was like an aftermath smoke residue left behind after she saw the white/green object shoot down,” said Ann.
“The smoke trail stayed in the sky for only a few minutes.”
Ann said that her daughter has a keen interest in astronomy and has her own theories as to what the object may have been.
“I think it was space rubbish or something like that,” said Anya. “I think it was on fire and left that smoke behind. I felt I’d seen like an alien falling from the sky. I’d not seen anything like it before and at the time I thought, ‘What was that?’
“I saw it in the corner of my eye and just thought it was a bright star but then looked again and saw a green light at the bottom of it. It was just three seconds and then gone.”
Anya’s theory about “space rubbish” entering the Earth’s atmosphere is not as far-fetched as it may initially sound. On average, a total of 200-400 tracked objects enter Earth’s atmosphere every year, says the National Environmental Satellite, Data, and Information Service.
It further states: “Thankfully human populations are rarely affected by things falling from outer space. This is largely a numbers game.
“Human populations live on a small percentage of the Earth’s total surface area. So any objects that do not burn up and disintegrate upon atmosphere re-entry are likely to fall into the ocean, which covers over 70 per cent of the surface of the Earth, or a sparsely populated land area.”
Interestingly, in the early hours of the same day, local man Alastair Ferrier saw another bright fireball shooting across the dark skies over Caithness.
The most common metallic meteors are iron-nickel and often give off a green colour when entering the Earth’s atmosphere. As reported in an Inverness Courier article about another comet seen across the Highlands in September 2022, the green light “did not come from little green men”.
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