NASA has confirmed that a 500-pound meteor about 2 feet in diameter entered the atmosphere over western Pennsylvania on early Tuesday morning, resulting in a massive fireball that lit up the pre-dawn sky.

The space rock was moving at a speed of 45,000 mph and was detected by three of the 15 black-and-white cameras NASA has installed around the country to capture such activity. NASA lost sight of the meteor at an altitude of about 13 miles, but based on calculations of its projected path, the agency speculated that fragments of the space rock could be found just east of Kittanning, Penn. You can watch the brief period when NASA's camera's captured the fireball in the video at the top of this post.

NASA had projected the asteroid's path to Earth, stating that the space rock passed by the main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter before its orbit sent it into a collision course with the Earth. NASA created animation showing the meteor's perspective as it approached Pennsylvania, which you can watch on the NASA Meteor Watch Facebook page.

Video screenshot by Anthony Domanico/CNET

(Via The Verge)