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Were there random shooting stars over Seattle and Portland?

Answer: Nope, just some SpaceX debris.

digital illustration of a shooting star
Shutterstock/paulista
Numerous residents in the Seattle and Portland areas noticed a very strange phenomenon in the night sky on Thursday. Many recorded the event, which looked like a sudden, concentrated stream of shooting stars. Some wondered if it might have been an unexpected meteor entering the Earth’s atmosphere and burning up.  

The true culprit, however, is expected to be a piece of SpaceX equipment. While the National Weather Service’s bureaus in both Portland and Seattle were awaiting confirmation on Friday, they both suspected that the phenomenon was caused by a Falcon 9 rocket.  

The rocket had launched in early March to deliver a payload of about 60 satellites and then come back to Earth. However, the craft failed to make a deorbit burn, in which it slows its speed enough so that it can begin its return to Earth. Since that maneuver failed, it re-entered the atmosphere after 22 days in orbit at a speed that caused it to burn up and create the mysterious lightshow seen from the ground.

 

Shooting stars? Debris? Anyone else see this in Seattle just now? @KING5Seattle @komonews #UFOs pic.twitter.com/4cmHiYUptn — Fred Lu (@fredlu_1618) March 26, 2021
 

 

We have been getting a number of calls about this! This looks like what we have seen in all of your videos. Not official, but this fits the bill. https://t.co/UX3SMtYwP0 — NWS Portland (@NWSPortland) March 26, 2021