Meteor spotted in night sky over Northern Ireland
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Tony Whilding, 38, from Wrexham, North Wales, had been on the lookout for the space rock after spotting the ball of flames.
Now, he has finally found it in a farmer’s field near his home.
Mr Whilding now hopes to get the out-of-this-world artefact valued, but believes it is “worth £100,000,” according to reports.
He said: “I was in my back garden having a midnight cigarette when I noticed the sky lighting up above my head.
“I looked up to see a low-flying ball of fire with two swirling trails of smoke.
“It got brighter as it approached my house at about twice its height.
“t was so low you could have kicked a football in the air and it would have reached it.
“As it crossed over, it extinguished within a few seconds. There was no noise, it just disappeared, leaving only the trials of smoke.”
A meteorite is a solid piece of debris from an object, such as a comet, asteroid, or meteoroid, that originates in outer space and survives its passage through the atmosphere to reach the surface of a planet or
When the original object enters the atmosphere, various factors such as friction, pressure, and chemical interactions with the atmospheric gases cause it to heat up and radiate energy.
It then becomes a meteor and forms a fireball.
Mr Whilding has regularly walked around the area he spotted the fireball for more than a year.
The father was overjoyed when he finally found it.
He said: “It was in a cornfield that had been ploughed, which is probably why I didn’t see it before,’ he said.
“It was covered in dry mud. When cleaned, it had a white fusion crust, a bit like glass.
‘The rock had two tones with white crystalline streaks – but it definitely wasn’t quartz.’
Due to their scarcity, meteorites can be worth a lot of money – according to Meteorlab.com, they can even go for $1,000 (£767) per gram.
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A US expert who examined Mr Whilding photos suggested the rock appeared to be a comet-crust meteorite, ruling out an “inner solar system meteorite,” according to Mail Online.
He said this is usually from “gaseous voids” left after cooling down from atmospheric entry.
Mr Whilding added: “I keep the rock on my bedside cabinet to remind me off that night.
“Whatever it is, it’s not of this Earth.
“I like to think it might even have come originally from a Hayley’s Comet meteor shower.”
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