Based on the preliminary analysis provided by the International Meteor Organization (IMO) database for Event 4347-2026, a detailed breakdown of the fireball’s trajectory and the associated eyewitness reports:

Event Overview: A fireball was sighted over Brunei and Sabah on Sunday, June 14, 2026, around 20:14 local time.

Eyewitness Reports: Four witnesses from Bandar Seri Begawan, Jerudong, Rasau, and Kudat reported the event, observing it for 3.5 to 7.5 seconds with intense brightness (magnitudes ranging from -5 to -13).

Trajectory & Path: The meteor traveled entirely offshore over the South China Sea, moving away from the Borneo coast in a North-Northwest (NNW) direction. It appears to have originated a few dozen kilometers off the coast of Brunei-Muara before heading deeper into the ocean. The starting point appears to begin off the northern coast of Borneo, near the maritime border of Brunei and Sabah, over the South China Sea. The meteor traveled in a North-Northwest (NNW) direction. The visible trajectory ends further out in the South China Sea, moving away from the coastline. It did not cross directly over land based on this calculated path.

By Hazarry bin Haji Ali Ahmad
The Astronomical Society of Brunei Darussalam
June 14, 2026

Bandar Seri Begawan – Bruneians were fortunate on Sunday evening to witness a rare and striking celestial show. At approximately 8:30 p.m. local time on June 14, 2026, a brilliantly bright green meteor tore through the atmosphere, leaving a vivid, glowing trail in its wake.

The Astronomical Society of Brunei Darussalam (PABD) received a surge of reports, dashboard camera footage, and incidental videos capturing the event, confirming the meteor’s trajectory and striking coloration.

Based on the initial reports submitted to PABD, the meteor appeared unusually large -consistent with a fireball – travelling at high velocity and illuminating the sky for approximately two to three seconds before fading. None of the witnesses reported any signs of fragmentation as it passed through the atmosphere. Instead, they described a sudden, vivid emerald flash that briefly lit up the night sky.

Among the locals who captured the breathtaking moment was Umair Akmal, who caught the event at 8:33 p.m. on his dashcam while driving through Lambak. He described the meteor as a solid green streak with a distinct trail that lasted for about two seconds. Struck by the rarity of the event, Umair noted that the bright green hue made it one of the most unusual celestial sights he had ever personally witnessed.

Around the same time, 27-year-old Khadijah Azami also recorded the fireball on her car camcorder while driving through Sungai Akar, heading toward the ISB-One City traffic light. She observed the meteor traveling in a southwest direction, describing the object as big, fast, and vividly green. Khadijah noted that the vibrant color was accompanied by a distinct, bright white flash as it flared up over a three-second span.

In astronomical terms, not every “shooting star” qualifies as a fireball. According to the International Astronomical Union (IAU), a fireball is defined as a meteor that reaches an apparent magnitude of –4 or brighter, exceeding the brilliance of Venus. All of eyewitnesses’ footages captured clearly demonstrates why Sunday’s event meets this criterion.

In another fortunate turn, Shahrazen Said shared a video captured by one of his team members, who recorded the fireball entirely by chance. In his Instagram Story caption, he explained that while filming footage for the football event Project WASP: The Next Level Training, the bright green object descended above the treeline and passed through the background of the shot. He later submitted the remarkable footage to PABD’s Instagram page, noting his surprise at having unintentionally recorded what he initially thought might be a comet falling from the sky.

While sightings of ordinary “shooting stars” are relatively common, the appearance of a bright green fireball is a far more exceptional phenomenon. Its distinctive colour is closely linked to the meteoroid’s chemical composition. As the object enters Earth’s atmosphere at extremely high velocity, the resulting friction generates intense heat, causing the meteoroid to vaporize. The vivid green emission is typically associated with the presence of magnesium or nickel within the material. When these metallic elements vaporize under extreme temperatures, they emit light predominantly in the green portion of the spectrum. This process produces the striking emerald trail reported across Brunei tonight.

The PABD is still actively collecting data to triangulate the exact size and trajectory of Sunday night’s fireball. Anyone who witnessed the green meteor or has dashcam or CCTV footage from around 8:30 p.m. is strongly encouraged to submit an official fireball report to the International Meteor Organization (IMO) – this event is officially catalogued and numbered as 4347-2026. By contributing to the IMO’s global citizen-science database, local observers can directly aid astronomers worldwide in tracking these incredible celestial events.

Bandar Seri Begawan – Despite challenging weather conditions, a group of fourteen members of the Astronomical Society of Brunei Darussalam (PABD) successfully conducted naked-eye observations of the annual Geminids Meteor Shower in the early hours of Sunday, 14 December 2025 at Kampong Sungai Mau, Belait.

The event, known as the “Geminids AstroCamp”, was held from 12:30 AM to 2:30 AM, during which members gathered to witness the celestial display and capture it through photography. Based on observations documented by the team, approximately 50 Geminid meteors were sighted, including several striking fireballs, despite limited visibility.

One participant, Muhammad Hidayatullah bin Awang Ahmad shared: “It was a challenging night for viewing, with nearly 80% cloud cover and overcast skies for most of the session. Nevertheless, the meteors we managed to observe, particularly the brighter fireballs, made the effort worthwhile.”

Despite cloudy skies, PABD member Mohamad Nur Raziqqien bin Abu Bakar captured a vivid Geminid meteor streaking across the prominent Orion constellation, which lies right next to Gemini – the radiant of the meteor shower.

The Geminids are widely regarded as one of the most reliable and spectacular annual meteor showers, originating from asteroid 3200 Phaethon. This year’s observation coincided with the shower’s peak between the nights of 13 and 14 December 2025. Under ideal conditions, the Geminids can produce as many as 120 meteors per hour (ZHR), making them a highlight of the astronomical calendar.

Meteor showers take place when the Earth, in its yearly orbit around the Sun, crosses paths with streams of cosmic debris released by comets or asteroids. These tiny fragments, often no larger than grains of sand, enter the atmosphere at tremendous speeds and incandesce due to friction with air molecules, creating the luminous streaks commonly referred to as “shooting stars.”

PABD thanked the Bukit Sawat Village Consultative Council (Majlis Perundingan Kampung Bukit Sawat) for their invaluable support in facilitating the AstroCamp.

Observers reported seeing the meteor from Brunei Muara District and as far Tutong District. One lucky eyewitness saw the greenish flash and captured what appears to be a bright fireball on his dashcam.

Alhakim, 31 years old, was on his way home from work. A brilliant cosmic beam flashed in front of his view when he was driving along Jalan Kebangsaan heading north towards Jalan Utama Mentiri highway at around 7.40 pm.

“On that evening, out of the blue came something from the sky, and (it) struck from above going all the way with a bright green light,” Alhakim recalled.

His 5-second dashcam footage revealed a meteor coming down from West to East and disintegrated in the air.

“Few seconds later, it dispersed which I guess it broke off,” he said. “It was beautiful!”

The fireball dashing safely above Jame’ ‘Asr Hassanil Bolkiah mosque was also captured by two home security cameras at residence of one of the PABD members in Kiarong.

“It was moving approximately at bearing 040 deg (NE) to 080 deg (E) from Kiarong,” Hj Azri said on his Instagram TV post.

Social media comments by few netizens mistakenly thought the fireball was a comet as Leonard (C/2021 A1) lightshow occurred during its close approach around the same week. A comet orbits in space will display a fuzzy nucleus with its main tail and remains in the sky for few hours.

A meteor or “shooting star”, on the other hand, is the brief flash of light due to dust fragments from space that strike the Earth’s atmosphere at high speeds, and the larger ones will display fireballs.

Sightings of fireball in the night sky can be reported by any public members to the International Meteor Organization (IMO) for studying meteors via online form https://www.imo.net/observations/fireballs/fireball-report-program/.

A bright light in the sky or a fireball meteor as seen in the video footage taken from Mabohai, which was shared to the Astronomical Society of Brunei Darussalam (PABD).

The dashcam was looking South at a traffic light stop in Jalan Kebangsaan when unexpectedly a bright flashing light moving westward emerged.

Mr Ng who reported the sighting to PABD said “I was driving towards Jalan Kumbang Pasang. As I was stopping at the traffic, my son and I saw a fast green meteor falling from the sky, and burning up until it disappeared.”

“My dashcam, which was continuously recording, caught the meteor event and I feel so luck!”

According to International Meteor Oganisation (IMO), fireballs are meteors that appear brighter than normal. Rapid falling meteor fragments larger than a grain of sand (about 1 millimeter) have the capability to produce a bright flash when encountering the atmosphere above. In fact, fireballs occur every day all over the Earth.

Thanks to Mr Christopher Ng for the report and video!

Did you see the fireball event? Do you have a photo or a video of this event? Please share us #bruneiastronomy. Contribute to the general database of knowledge about meteors by reporting to the International Meteor Organisation (IMO) here Report a Fireball

Bandar Seri Begawan – The Astronomical Society of Brunei Darussalam (PABD) is still investigating after sightings of a mysterious fireball accompanied with a loud bang was reported falling to earth in broad daylight last week, January 31, 2021.

On Sunday (February 7, 2021), a team of members of the PABD conducted further examination at the locations based on firsthand sighting video and photograph of the meteor event.

PABD is also working closely with the Sabah Stargazers with the support by a group of 4×4 off-road enthusiasts known as Jimmy Sierra Brunei Community by exchanging information on the coordinates in the sky of the reported meteor.

Currently, there are two key sources of evidence based on two dashcam-footage that accidentally caught the meteor at the same time – from Kampong Kulapis, Brunei Darussalam and Penampang, Sabah. These useful information were solid proof to determine the approximate physical characteristics of the meteor and its location, which were later triangulated by statistics from another eyewitness.

The fireball brightness is difficult to estimate due to bright sunlight, but usually ranges from magnitude -5 (equivalent to the planet Venus) to magnitude -10 (light produced by a half-illuminated moon). Based on the video recording by Abd Wafiy bin Hj Rudzi, the light from a fireball was estimated to be at magnitude -13 which is equivalent to the light produced by a full moon. This makes the event exceedingly rare and special.

Most ordinary meteors with diameter 1 millimeter or about the size of a grain of sand have the capability to produce a rapid flash as they streak the sky. But bright fireball that was seen easily in the daytime last week are many times that size – anywhere from a baseball-sized object to something as big as a small car.

Preliminary analysis by PABD has pinpointed the estimated location of the meteor explosion which occurred in the airspace of South China Sea, about 30 kilometers away from Bandar Seri Begawan, near the Brunei Bay and Southwest of Labuan Island.

Based on the elevation angles, the position of the fireball when the intense explosion occurred was computed about 35 km high above the ground.

When a meteor traveling at tremendous velocities penetrates to the Earth’s stratosphere, at an altitude of below 60 kilometers and explodes as a bolide, there is a high chance that the meteor triggers sonic boom which can be heard on the ground below.

NASA’s Geostationary Lightning Mapper (GLM) instruments on GOES weather satellites has detected the fireball travelling at velocity of 14 km/s, about 40 times the speed of sound with radiated energy impact in the atmosphere of equivalent to 720 tons of TNT above Brunei Darussalam. This information was reported by the Centre of Near-Earth Object Studies, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology.

The International Meteor Organization (IMO) has also verified and catalogued last week’s incident as Event 632-2021 on their website. In addition to the sonic boom heard by hundreds of netizens over social media, there were 11 confirmed reports about a fireball was seen over Belait District, Brunei-Muara District and Sabah on Sunday, January 31, 2021 around 03:02 UT or 11:02 am local time. However, the meteor trajectory and impact status has not yet been established due to missing reliable and accurate data.

The IMO’s International Fireball Program analyses meteor information provided by public eyewitness online which can be combined with other eye-witnesses to give a good estimate of the trajectory of the fireball, to help determine if a ground fall occurred and perhaps if the meteorite can be recovered.

Since 2005, the IMO had received about 224,000 fireballs reports from around the world, or an average of 15,000 reports every year.  Only a very few fireballs relate to meteorite falls.

PABD is keen to share the data and findings to the international and regional scientific community to further conduct a research on the meteor.

Bandar Seri Begawan – A huge fireball boomed over the Brunei skies and was bright enough to be seen in the daylight today, January 31, 2021.

The Astronomical Society of Brunei Darussalam (PABD) had received numerous reports by the public who had heard a mysterious loud bang in the sky and put up a notice seeking for first-hand eyewitness accounts.

Dozens of people sighting the spectacular phenomenon of a roaring sound from a disintegrated meteor based on eyewitness testimonies. The large boom that was heard and felt from across all districts in Brunei.

Haziq, 22 years old, reported to PABD of first seeing an unexpected bright blueish-green light falling from the sky over Mulaut, and tried to take the photo of the moment. Haziq mentioned “The brightness increased really quick then reduced to an orange reddish colour for a fraction of a second.”

The frightful sound or sonic boom apparently accompanied this planetary rock from space. Another eyewitness, Zaty, 35, also encountered a similar shocking moment from Jerudong. She said, “I saw a bright ball of fire coming from the sky and there was a loud explosion a minute later.”

Some eyewitnesses had reported of seeing the similar meteor streaked through the sky over Lumut. An anonymous observer, 33, said “I believe I saw a meteor occurred this morning on our approach to land at Anduki Heliport in Seria around 11 a.m. local time, but I didn’t hear if there is any explosion due to noise from helicopter”.

Hakem from Tutong said “We were at Penanjong beach and my daughter saw a light orange ball in the sky with a tail of light for a couple of seconds before it disappeared “.

An e-mail from Lau Shien Chung to PABD reported that the fireball was also spotted from Temburong. She mentioned, “One of my colleagues, Ginda, saw a fire trail in the sky at Temburong National Park. He saw the blazing fire at first and the sound of explosion came after.”

Meteors are an irregular and not normal events. Most of the time, meteors are the result of the complete burnt up of a small meteoroid in the atmosphere. Few meteoroids did survive to Earth which are called meteorites.

Bandar Seri Begawan – A few bright streaks of fireballs produced by the Lyrids were spotted in the early hours today, April 23, 2020.

Despite mostly cloudy, these bright meteor streaks were caught live during the clear hours by an all-sky camera installed at the mini observatory in Tutong, Brunei Darussalam.

The milky way band stretching across the sky was also clearly visible at round 2 am. The shower was originating near the star known as Vega with radiant in the constellation Lyra.

You can view the broadcasted live video of the cosmic display on fb.com/bruneiastronomy