A loud boom heard by the governor of Utah and scores of others Saturday was “likely” caused by a meteor hitting the Earth’s atmosphere, officials said.
“Heard this while out on a run in SLC (Salt Late City),” tweeted Utah Gov. Spencer Cox in response to another user who posted a video of the sound. “We have confirmed it was not seismic/earthquake and not related to our military instillations [sic].”
Referring to the suggestion of a meteor being the culprit, Cox said the hypothesis “is likely the best theory.”
The National Weather Service’s Salt Lake City office said radar signals about Davis and Morgan counties that typically track lightning strikes saw activity with evidence of thunderstorms on satellite or radar.
The agency said the findings bolster the meteor theory and that the meteor trail was likely the cause of the aberration on the lightning mapper.
Utah residents posted numerous videos capturing the boom, and a video by the Snowbasin Ski Resort’s camera showed the meteor visibly streaking across the daytime sky.
Bolstering the meteor theory for this morning’s #boom in #Utah, the two reddish pixels shown over Davis and Morgan counties are from the GOES-17 Lightning Mapper, but not associated with evidence of thunderstorm activity in satellite or radar.
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