What was that fireball in the sky above Eugene and Springfield? See the video

This story has been updated to add new information.

A large fireball was seen streaking across the sky on Aug. 13, treating Eugene and Springfield residents to an after show of the previous night's meteor shower.

Springfield resident Chris Geiszler took a video at approximately 10 p.m. on Aug. 13 as he and his family went out for a walk.

"We took our six kiddos out for a walk and saw an orange glow in the far distance of the sky and as we continued watching it, there seemed to be more and more breaking off the main fireball," Geiszler said.

In the nearly 1-minute long video, excited voices can be heard as a fiery trail is seen whizzing across the night sky. The trail then appears to break up into multiple pieces before disappearing.

A large fireball was seen streaking across the sky on Aug.13, treating Eugene and Springfield residents to an aftershow of the previous night's meteor shower.

Others also saw the fireball. In a Eugene Reddit thread, users commented the sight lasted at least 30 seconds and some believed it to be a meteor while others believed it to be a satellite or falling debris.

University of Oregon Professor of Astronomy Scott Fisher said he thinks it was satellite debris re-entering the atmosphere. He said there were two reasons.

"The speed of the objects moving across the sky is too slow for them to be meteors," he said in an email. Secondly, "the duration of the event was too long for it to be a meteor."

Fisher said even large meterors tend to burn up very rapidly when they hit the atmosphere.

According to NASA, most orbital debris is composed of manmade objects like pieces of spacecraft and satellites that are no longer working. Some of these objects often break apart in Earth's atmosphere and can sometimes be seen by viewers on Earth.

It's unclear whether the fireball was a meteor or a satellite. While its speed and exposure indicate that it may be space debris breaking apart, it comes just one day after the Perseids meteor shower peaked on Aug 12.

Ginnie Sandoval is the Oregon Connect reporter for the Statesman Journal. Sandoval can be reached [email protected] on X at @GinnieSandoval.

This article originally appeared on Register-Guard: Large fireball streaks across sky in Oregon: See the video