VIDEO: Meteor jolts Earth in Victoria, Australia. Was it linked to meteor shower?

Australians saw a meteor streaking through the sky on Sunday night, with some reporting that they felt the ground shake. Residents of the state of Victoria witnessed the fireball in regions like Bendigo, Ballarat and the western areas of Melbourne. The meteor was captured on dashcams and CCTVs at around 8 pm. People on social media reported that there was some movement in the ground following the meteor strike. The landing place of the meteor is not known, although most of it likely burned up in the atmosphere. Experts believe that the fragments may have landed on the ground between Bendigo and Ballarat. Those who reported hearing a "sonic boom", recalled feeling like an earthquake had hit the area.

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Meteor shakes ground in Australia

One of them in the Bendigo suburb of Strathfieldsaye told ABC News Australia that the sound led her to think that her neighbour's house had exploded. She even called them to check if something had gone wrong. The sonic boom has excited scientists who say that this means that large pieces of the meteor could have fallen to the ground. "To be able to hear the sonic boom loudly from the ground suggests that quite a big chunk of the meteor was pretty close to the ground," Associate Professor Michael Brown from Monash University’s school of physics and astronomy told The Age.

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Was meteor in Australia linked to meteor shower?

This comes as the Perseids meteor shower peaks in the night sky. However, those familiar with such space rocks do not think that the two events are related. Astronomer Perry Vlahos told The Age that it seems to be a "sporadic meteor", one with a non-specific origin. Sunday night's fireball was neither linked to the Perseids nor the Alpha Capricornids, he added. Also, "the point the meteors appear to radiate out from never rises above the horizon for us at the latitude of Victoria," Vlahos said. Hence, it could not have originated from the meteor showers. Meanwhile, Amateur astronomer David Finlay told ABC that the meteor was quite large, as shown by the sonic boom it generated, a meteor event that is rare in Australia.

A listener named Justin called into the ABC Radio Melbourne show Talkback and reported that he saw the object in Ballarat, and it was so bright that he "thought it was a plane crash." He added, "It slowly moved across, and then it just went straight, fast down to wherever it went." Another listener said the thumping felt like an explosion, and the " house seemed to lift up and drop down again."