What lit up Mexico City’s sky at 4 a.m.? Scientists explain rare bolide event

Residents of Mexico City and different areas successful cardinal Mexico were jolted awake aboriginal Wednesday by a large detonation and a agleam flash crossed the sky.

The lawsuit was aboriginal confirmed by monitoring services arsenic a bolide — an exceptionally agleam meteor that explodes successful Earth’s atmosphere.

¡Impresionante avistamiento en el cielo!
☄️💥 Esta madrugada, en el centro del país, se registró un fuerte sonido akin a una explosión cerca de las 04:51 horas.

Cámaras de seguridad y Webcams de México captaron el paso de lo que se considera un meteorito a las 03:47:06. pic.twitter.com/0KRHH04pU1

— Bóveda Informativa (@bovedainfo) April 16, 2025

The improvement occurred astatine astir 3:49 a.m. section clip today, sparking wide societal media buzz but nary contiguous reports of damage, injuries, debris oregon interaction sites.

The autarkic seismic monitoring work Sismo Alerta Mexicana detected the explosion’s acoustic question via seismographs, affirming connected societal media it originated from a bolide that exploded an estimated 12 to 25 miles supra the Earth’s surface.

“Based connected reports and our cameras, we corroborate that the detonation successful Mexico City was a bolide (possibly a meteorite oregon meteor) that exploded 20-40 km supra the ground, creating an acoustic wave,” the radical stated connected X.

As of midday Wednesday, Mexico’s Civil Protection bureau and authorities agencies had yet to contented authoritative statements.

Though radical successful Mexico City reported vibrations, Mexico’s National Seismological Service did not grounds earthquake activity.

The sound, delayed by its question clip from the high-altitude blast, was heard crossed the metropolis and different regions successful the CDMX metropolitan area, including Ecatepec and Cuautitlán Izcalli. 

Video footage shows the agleam entity streaking crossed the entity earlier the explosion, with immoderate witnesses seeing the improvement successful Querétaro and Pachuca, astir 185 and 88 kilometers from CDMX, respectively.

Social media reports picture the lawsuit arsenic a almighty detonation that caused vibrations, rattled windows and triggered car alarms. 

Videos from information cameras and Webcams de México captured the fireball’s streak, described by astatine slightest 1 witnesser arsenic a “giant shooting star.”

Daniel Flores, a researcher astatine the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) Astronomy Institute, told the media that bolides are abstraction rocks that vaporize owed to atmospheric friction, dissimilar meteorites, which scope Earth’s surface. “These objects vigor up intensely, creating airy and sound, but astir disintegrate harmlessly,” helium said.

Experts emphasized that specified events are communal globally, with an estimated 17,000 bolides entering Earth’s ambiance annually, though fewer are noticed.

The incidental brings to caput a “supposed” meteorite onslaught successful Tamaulipas successful 2020 and a meteor detonation successful Russia equivalent to 500 kilotons of TNT that caused wide harm and injuries successful 2013 — focusing attraction connected the request to show near-Earth objects (NEOs) and make aboriginal informing systems.

Mexico happens to beryllium the location of the seventh-largest meteor ever recovered connected Earth, the Bacubirito meteorite, which weighs 20 to 22 tonnes; it’s besides the 3rd largest successful the Americas and, astatine 4.25 meters, the longest meteor ever found. Discovered successful 1863 by a husbandman adjacent the municipality of Bacubirito, Sinaloa, it is housed astatine the Sinaloa Science Center. 

Mexico’s fascination with meteors tin besides beryllium experienced astatine the Museo del Meteorito, oregon the Meteorite Museum, which opened successful 2022 successful Progreso, Yucatán.

With reports from Infobae, Milenio, N+ and Noticias Activas