By Tim Binnall
A mystery boom heard in Arizona over the weekend was seemingly sufficiently explained until yet another blast rocked the region a few days later, leaving residents and authorities flummoxed. The curious case reportedly began this past Sunday morning when several people in the state's Yavapai County reported hearing a thunderous sound that raised concerns among many witnesses. "It was so shocking, so loud I started scanning the horizon and looking for a mushroom cloud," recalled Bruce Bilbrey, "I thought some kind of a massive bomb or something had gone off."
As is often the case with such mystery booms, local police departments were quickly flooded with phone calls from worried citizens wondering what could have caused the enormous blast. An initial investigation failed to yield an answer to the mystery as neither the FAA nor a local Air Force base knew of anything under their jurisdiction which could have created the sound. Within a few hours, it was ultimately determined that the blast likely came from a meteor entering the atmosphere.
This theory was bolstered by a piece of footage captured by a local planetary scientist Robert Ward who heard the sound and recognized it as a meteor. He subsequently ran outside, looked in the sky, and spotted the telltale sign of such an event, which is a lingering smoke-like effect known as a 'persistent train.' Thanks to Ward's video and observation, the mystery boom was attributed to a meteor. While that would seem to have closed the case, things took a strange turn when yet another thunderous blast shook the county.
According to the Yavapai County Sheriff's Office, their phone lines lit up once again on Tuesday evening at around 8 PM as numerous residents reported hearing a second mystery boom. "As before, there is no clear indication at this time as to the source," the department posted to social media, assuring residents that "we continue to monitor the situation." Even Ward, who essentially solved the Sunday case, conceded that the subsequent boom has left him rather confounded, musing that "I'm scratching my head too. This is quite baffling."
Although this second boom probably does not upend the meteor explanation for Sunday's blast, considering the video evidence captured by Ward, it certainly adds a layer of confusion to the two events. Could the second sound have come from another meteor entering the atmosphere? Or is there an altogether different explanation for the odd incident? Share your theory with us at the Coast to Coast AM Facebook page.