A brilliantly bright meteor lit up skies across western Japan at 11:08 p.m. on 19 Aug., briefly turning night to day from Kyushu and Shikoku to as far east as Osaka’s Kansai Airport. The event, captured on the Sakurajima volcano livestream and multiple airport and dash-board cameras, showed a blue-green flash that lasted only a few seconds before the object disappeared near the horizon. The Kagoshima office of the Japan Meteorological Agency said the object was most likely a fireball—an exceptionally bright meteor. Television network analyses and footage reviewed by professional and amateur astronomers indicate the bolide was roughly 10 metres across. Daichi Fujii, curator at the Hiratsuka City Museum, estimated the rock entered the atmosphere at about 21 km per second before breaking apart high above the Pacific, while Sendai Space Museum director Toshihisa Maeda said its luminosity rivalled a full moon. Both experts believe surviving fragments, if any, fell into the sea south of Kyushu. Local authorities and police reported no injuries, structural damage or disruption to aviation. Though Japan experiences regular meteor showers, scientists described a fireball of similar intensity as a once-a-year spectacle.