Dubai's Sky Lit Up With A Meteor Shower

An object was seen falling from Dubai's sky, which appeared to be a meteor shower - but was it?

Posted on

17 October 2017

| Last updated on 14 January 2020

Social media was quite the buzz last night after Dubai's sky lit up with a meteor falling from the sky. At around 7:30 pm on Monday, October 16th, 2017 UAE residents could see a spectacular view of the falling object for about 80 seconds. Even Sheikh Hamdan reported to have seen the meteoroid shower in Dubai last night.

Curious observers were speculating whether the object was a meteor, space station or unidentified object.

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Oct 16, 2017 at 11:08am PDT

Some spectators said it looked like a plane with sparks coming out of the back while others thought it might be fireworks. One resident even reported that her daughter thought that it is the end of the world!

Soon after, the Mohammed bin Rashid Space Centre and the General Civil Aviation Authority (GCAA) eventually set everyone at ease, confirming that it wasn’t an unidentified flying object, but rather a meteor that penetrated Earth’s orbit.

However it seems that it was something else entirely.

Dubai Sky Lit Up With A Meteor Shower

Image Credit: satview.org

In a statement released on October 17th, the Dubai Astronomy Group announced that the falling meteor that was seen wasn’t a meteor but actually a satellite - or more specifically, a Russian made spacecraft that had burnt out when hitting the Earth's atmosphere.

After all - with more and more countries venturing into space, more ‘junk’ is falling from space.