A “fireball” was seen in the sky across several provinces in northern Thailand on the evening of 14th November 2025. It is believed to have been an exploding meteor.
At 5.07pm yesterday, residents in upper northern provinces such as Chiang Rai, Chiang Mai, Lamphun, Phayao and Nan reported seeing a bright flash of light in the northern sky. No damage or danger was reported. Initial assessments suggest it was a bolide, an exploding meteor, which cannot be linked to any known meteor shower and is unrelated to the landing of China’s Shenzhou-20 mission.
Based on video clips circulating on social media, the object appears to have been a bright bolide. Such meteors typically flare up at altitudes of 80–120 kilometres above earth’s surface and can therefore be seen from wide areas, especially across northern Thailand.
Checks with the Shenzhou-20 mission—which returned Chinese astronauts from China’s Tiangong Space Station—show that its return capsule landed in Inner Mongolia at 15:30 Thailand time, well before the fireball appearance. Therefore, the event is not connected to the spacecraft.
As for meteor showers active in mid-November [2][3], none corresponds with this fireball:
Leonids – The radiant point in Leo had already set below the horizon.
Northern & Southern Taurids – The radiant in Taurus had not yet risen.
Alpha Monocerotids – Begins on 15 November.
November Orionids – The radiant in Orion had not yet risen.
It is therefore likely that this meteor came from a random meteoroid entering earth’s atmosphere, rather than from any known meteor stream.
In fact, small objects from space enter earth’s atmosphere daily. Astronomers estimate that an average of 48.5 tonnes of meteoritic material falls towards earth each day [4]. Almost all burns up in the atmosphere, and any fragments that reach the ground usually fall into oceans or remote areas.
The object seen in this event does not appear in the database of Near-Earth Objects (NEOs). According to NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), as of 12 November 2025, there are 39,949 known NEOs [5], including:
11,477 larger than 140 metres
878 larger than 1 kilometre
124 near-Earth comets
This indicates that astronomers have already detected essentially all large NEOs, calculated their orbits, and confirmed they pose no threat. Smaller NEOs, however—typically only a few metres wide—are harder to detect due to distance and size. Nonetheless, improving technology (telescope networks, control systems, databases, and orbital-calculation tools) continues to increase detection rates, helping reduce the risk of an unexpected impact.
Reference:
Information supplied by: Pisit Nithiyanun – Astronomy Information Officer, NARIT