Thousands of meteors enter Earth’s atmosphere every day and burn up in spectacular fireballs. The vast majority of these objects, however, are either too small to be visible, or they fall over oceans or uninhabited areas, or they fall invisibly in the sunlight during the day. Even at night, when shooting stars are most likely to be seen, most people are indoors or asleep.
Witnessing one of these memorable meteorological events is for most people quite rare. The American Meteor Society (AMS), which collects fireball reports from around the world, estimates that even experienced observers might see one high-magnitude meteor every 200 hours of meteor observing.
Because these phenomena are often visible for less than a second, photographs of them are extremely rare. 24/7 Wall St. reviewed hundreds of photographs submitted by meteor enthusiasts to the AMS and selected the brightest, most beautiful examples of recently-observed shooting stars available for use. The location and time of each sighting were also obtained from the AMS.
If you love space, check out our story on exactly what it takes to become an astronaut.
Click here to see 14 of the brightest shooting stars ever photographed
> Sighted over: Portsmouth, New Hampshire
> On: February 28, 2012
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> Sighted over: Liberty Island, United States
> On: July 10, 2016
> Sighted over: Ballintoy, United Kingdom
> On: February 2, 2019
> Sighted over: Albany, Missouri
> On: May 15, 2019
> Sighted over: South Lake Tahoe, California
> On: June 27, 2019
> Sighted over: Cuatrociénegas Municipality, Mexico
> On: July 3, 2019
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> Sighted over: Piermont, New Hampshire
> On: July 24, 2019
> Sighted over: Artignosc-sur-Verdon, France
> On: August 8, 2019
> Sighted over: Springfield, New Zealand
> On: August 31, 2019
> Sighted over: Evergreen, Colorado
> On: September 17, 2019
> Sighted over: Albany, Missouri
> On: October 17, 2019
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> Sighted over: Northville, Michigan
> On: December 23, 2019
> Sighted over: Beijing, China
> On: January 30, 2020
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> Sighted over: Werder, Germany
> On: January 5, 2020
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