One
hundred years ago today the Great Meteor Procession of 1913 occurred, a
sky event described by some as "magnificent" and "entrancing" and which
left people feeling "spellbound" and "privileged". Because one had to
be in a right location, outside, and under clear skies, only about 1,000
people noted seeing the procession. Lucky sky gazers -- particularly
those near Toronto, Canada -- had their eyes drawn to an amazing train
of bright meteors streaming across the sky, in groups, over the course
of a few minutes. A current leading progenitor hypothesis is that a
single large meteor once grazed the Earth's atmosphere and broke up.
When the resulting pieces next encountered the Earth, they came in over
south-central Canada, traveled thousands of kilometers as they crossed
over the northeastern USA, and eventually fell into the central Atlantic
ocean. Pictured above is a digital scan of a halftone hand-tinted image
by the artist Gustav Hahn who was fortunate enough to witness the event
first hand. Although nothing quite like the Great Meteor Procession of
1913 has been reported since, numerous bright fireballs -- themselves
pretty spectacular -- have since been recorded, some even on video.
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