Brilliant Light Plunging Into Pacific May Have Been Meteor

A bright red and green light that appeared to plunge into the Pacific Ocean on Monday night may have been a meteor, an astronomer said.

About 30 people from Santa Barbara to Marina del Rey called U.S. Coast Guard and law enforcement officials about 8:20 p.m. to report what they thought was a meteorite, a flare or a downed aircraft, authorities said.

Crews in boats and helicopters equipped with infrared scopes were sent to search for crash debris in Los Angeles Harbor and Marina del Rey, but they found nothing.

Paramedic Robert Johnson saw the brilliant burst of light in Sherman Oaks while sitting around a bonfire with fellow firefighters.

“I could see how people thought it was a plane,” he said. “There were flames coming out, but they were green and large.

“This thing was hot and just going before it disappeared below the horizon,” he said. “I thought it was going to crash into something.”

Troy Powers, a museum guide at Griffith Observatory, said that judging from the descriptions, “it could have been a meteor.”

“It might have impacted the water, although that’s pretty rare,” he said. More likely, he said, “it was a meteor, between the size of a naval orange and a basketball, about 40 to 50 miles high in the atmosphere.”