VIDEO: Bright streak of fireballs crossing the sky in Madrid and Segovia, Spain, at 53,000 kilometers per hour

According to astrophysicist Jose María Madiedo, from the Andalusian Institute of Astrophysics (IAA-CSIC), the bright fireball was generated by a rock (a meteoroid) from an asteroid that hit the atmosphere at around 53,000 km/h.

The sudden friction when meeting the Earth’s atmosphere at this enormous speed made the meteoroid appear incandescent, creating a fireball that flew over the Community of Madrid and the province of Segovia.

The fireball started at an altitude of about 74 km above the town of Pedrezuela (Madrid), moved to the northwest and ended at an altitude of about 33 km above Navalilla (province of Segovia).

However, the great luminosity that this solidus reached meant that it could be seen more than 700 kilometers away from those places.

Throughout its trajectory there were several explosions that caused sudden increases in its luminosity and that were due to sudden ruptures of the rock.

The total distance the fireball traveled through the atmosphere before dying out was about 77 kilometers and the rock was totally destroyed in the atmosphere, meaning no fragments made it to the ground.

Their presence was detected by the detectors of the SMART project at the Calar Alto, Sierra Nevada, Seville, La Sagra (Granada), Huelva, Huelva, Breda (Tarragona) and Sant Celoni (Girona) surveillance stations.

The event has been analyzed by the principal investigator of the SMART project: Dr. Jose M. Madiedo, from the Instituto de Astrofísica de Andalucía (IAA-CSIC).

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