Bright fireball seen streaking across afternoon sky in N.J., other eastern states
Updated: Apr. 07, 2026, 5:46 p.m. |Published: Apr. 07, 2026, 3:38 p.m
A bright fireball was spotted in the sky Tuesday afternoon over parts of New Jersey and several other eastern states, including New York and Pennsylvania, according to social media posts and eyewitness reports submitted to the
American Meteor Society.
The AMS, which tracks meteors across the globe, received 99 reports of Tuesday’s fireball as of 3 p.m., including 28 from New Jersey. By 4 p.m., the total number of reports rose to 186.
☄️ Sounds like reports of meteors over our region are way up today. @firem3_nj sent us this video that they say they took heading from Paramus to Newark airport this afternoon.
www.facebook.com
Most of the witnesses reported seeing a bright flash in the sky between 2:35 p.m. and 2:40 p.m., and some reported seeing several green-colored fragments streaking across the sky for several seconds.
On Facebook, several New Jersey residents reported hearing a loud boom and said their house rattled at the time the fireball was zipping across the sky.
Reports came in from various towns and cities in Atlantic, Bergen, Burlington, Camden, Gloucester, Mercer, Middlesex, Monmouth, Morris, Ocean, Somerset, Sussex and Warren counties.
Some witnesses said the flash lasted between 3 and 4 seconds, while others reported the streak of light remaining in the sky as long as 11 to 12 seconds.
On the AMS website, a resident of Neptune Township in Monmouth County reported hearing a “boom” followed by a “rumble.”
A person from Doylestown, Pennsylvania, reported seeing “several small bright spots spitting off and moving separately behind the main fireball.”
In addition to New Jersey, New York and Pennsylvania, reports of meteor sightings were submitted by people in Connecticut, Maryland, North Carolina, Virginia and Washington, D.C.
“It was insanely cool to see,” a resident of Heathsville, Virginia, reported, saying the fireball was moving “from up left to down right” and she heard “a muffled boom.”
“The fireball flashed brightly after 2 to 3 seconds of watching it streak across the sky from left to right,” a woman from Falls Church, Virginia reported. “As the fireball flashed I saw one or two smaller bright pieces break away before it faded away.”
It’s not uncommon for meteors to be streaking across the sky at almost any time of the year, but they are most often spotted at night when the sky is dark.
Fireballs are very bright meteors, and they are sometimes bright enough to be seen during daylight hours.
