Huge Fireball Lights Up European Skies As Meteorite Slams Into A German Roof

by Aaron Leong — Tuesday, March 10, 2026, 10:52 AM EDT

A bright meteoric fireball streaked across the European sky this week, providing a rare and dramatic six-second-long display for onlookers with their phones and cameras. According to the European Space Agency (ESA), however, at least one German home was struck by smaller pieces of the meteorite.

According to the ESA and the European AllSky7 fireball network, the initial flash occurred at approximately 18:55 CET, as a small natural space rock, estimated to be a few meters in diameter, entered Earth's atmosphere at speed. Moving from the southwest toward the northeast, the object remained visible for an unusually long duration of six seconds. In this window, the brilliant bolide illuminated the twilight for observers in Belgium, France, Germany, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands. As the object reached lower, denser layers of the atmosphere, the intense pressure caused it to fracture, leaving a glowing trail and producing audible sonic booms reported by people on the ground.

meteor germany — Multiple eyewitnesses across Europe were able to snap photos of the fireball (left) and the resulting smoke trail (right) as the meteor broke apart. (Credit: Patrick H. (left) and Katharina A. (right) via International Meteor Organization)

Most of the meteoroid vaporized during the descent, but ESA says that at least one fragment survived the re-entry. In the Güls district of Koblenz, Germany, a rock roughly the size of a soccer ball punched a hole through the roof of a residential building and landed in a bedroom. Local police confirmed that although the impact caused major damage to the roof and floor tiles, the residents were thankfully in another room at the time and no injuries were reported.

The event was also meticulously documented by the AllSky7 fireball network, a consortium of dedicated meteor cameras. Data from stations like Bernd Klemt’s AMS76 in Herkenrath provided the precise trajectory needed for ESA scientists to reconstruct the object's path.

Preliminary analysis suggests the rock approached from a region of the sky near the Sun, which can be a blind spot for most ground-based telescopes (explaining why it wasn't detected before entry in the first place). For these kinds of scenarios, upcoming projects like ESA's Flyeye telescope can't come soon enough. The telescope's wide-field surveying system that can cover 44² degrees field-of-view would've been most useful.

asteroid esa — *Asteroid danger explained (Credit: ESA)*

Field researchers have already recovered several centimeter-sized fragments from the Koblenz site. Preliminary inspections suggest the meteorites are chondrites, the most common type of stony space rock, though they have been sent for laboratory analysis to confirm their chemical makeup and origin.

Main photo credit: Marcel W. via International Meteor Organization)