MORRIS COUNTY

Meteor over Morris captured on video

William Westhoven
@WWesthoven

Did you see it?

In this screen capture from a dash-cam video, a meteor can be seen in the top right corner as it descends over Route 287 south in the Cedar Knolls section of Hanover on Monday, Dec. 29, 2014.

A motorist captured video of a meteor descending from the early Monday evening sky while driving south on Route 287 in the Cedar Knolls section of Hanover.

A few hours later, Pete Czech of Cedar Grove posted the video on Twitter and set off a fury of sharing that included national TV news outlets including the "Today" show and "Good Morning, America."

SEE VIDEO: > http://dailyre.co/1zthEKZ

"The video doesn't really do it justice," Czech told the Daily Record. "It was huge and really lit up the sky. You couldn't miss it. It really was a once-in-a-lifetime thing."

Czech, founder of the web design and development company The New Possibilities Group based in Rutherford, captured the video on the dash-cam of his car, specifically a Garmin Dash Cam 20.

"I got it for Christmas," he said. "I'm a tech guy and a gadget guy. It took me a while to get the video off the Garmin but when I saw it, it was amazing."

Pete Czech in his car, with the dash-cam he used to record a video of a meteor falling from the sky while driving on Route 287 south Monday night 12/29/14 in the Cedar Knolls section of Hanover.

The American Meteor Society reported that it received more than 220 reports of a bright fireball on Monday. The meteor was observed over a large portion of the eastern United States stretching from Maine to Maryland.

The event occurred at approximately 6:35 p.m., the society reported.

Czech was on the road driving home from a family function.

"My parents were in the back seat and I said 'Did you see that?' " he said. "They saw it, too."

Czech was pleased but not terribly surprised over the public's fascination with his video.

"I understand the phenomenon and how these things get around," he said. "It was kind of cool. My sister called and said she saw it on the 'Today' show, which I missed."

Staff Writer William Westhoven: 973-428-6627; wwesthoven@dailyrecord.com.