Fireball over Extremadura (southwest Spain) on May 27th 2017

Near six month since the last important event regarding fireball detection, last night May 27th 2017, SMART Project detectors and Calar Alto surveillance webcams could record a fireball travelling northeastward over Extremadura (southwest Spain) at 03:43 UT (05:43 local time).

This object could be observed from Calar Alto Observatory, with west surveillance webcam, and from La Hita (Toledo) and Sevilla Observatories.

Following SMART Project PI Professor José María Madiedo (University of Huelva) preliminary analysis, the event started at an altitude of about 100 Km over Badajoz province (south west Spain). From there the fireball moved northeastward, finishing at about 40 km of altitude over the town of Saceruela (Ciudad Real).

The path followed by this fireball over Extremadura and a little of Castilla La Mancha (Ciudad Real) can be seen in the above image. The video recorded with Calar Alto Observatory surveillance west webcam is shown below.

Calar Alto (CAHA) fireball detection station, together with the one at the Observatory of Sierra Nevada (IAA-CSIC) and others placed at different locations in Spain, are part of the S.M.A.R.T. project led by Professor José María Madiedo (University of Huelva) to track that kind of objects. Specifically, Calar Alto (CAHA) station and the one at Sierra Nevada (IAA-CSIC) constitute a collaboration agreement between Professor Madiedo and both institutions.