Doorbell camera captures shooting star near Cardiff during January meteor shower
Video credit: Colin Hyde/Media Wales
The moment a meteor passed through the night sky has been captured on film by a doorbell camera on the outskirts of Cardiff.
The fireball was picked up on camera at around 8pm on January 9 in Taffs Well.
The footage, shared by Colin Hyde, shows a white light getting increasingly brighter as it shoots past.
Often called "shooting stars", meteors are objects in space that enter the earth's atmosphere at high-speed, burning up. They range in size, from a small dust particle to an asteroid.
Mr Hyde believes the meteor was "most likely" the end of the Quadrantid meteor shower, which saw some 3,000 meteors recorded by 138 cameras in the first week of January according to the UK Meteor Network (UKMON).
The Quadrantids are often considered one of the best annual meteor showers and peak during early-January each year.
Other sightings were reported on January 9, including in Sussex and Hertfordshire. These could have all been the same meteor filmed by Mr Hyde's doorbell camera.
A Nest CCTV camera in Bristol also captured the moment the meteor curved through the air while a woman in Chippenham said: "I couldn't believe it. I was standing outside waiting for a lift to work when the sky lit up.
"A bright orange ball flew through the sky – it was incredible."
One stargazer said: "It was an absolutely amazing experience – never saw anything like that before."
The Met Office confirmed that a meteor had been seen just after 8pm on January 9 following a clear night for many parts of the country.
UKMON tweeted on January 10 saying: "A fireball at 8pm last night was reported by 500+ members of the public and was recorded by 13 cameras."
It is estimated that the meteor entered the atmosphere at 89km with a speed of just 10.21km/s, while on orbit close to Jupiter.
The next annual meteor shower that can be seen from the northern hemisphere is in April, called the Lyrid shower.