The Night the Stars Fell
On a November night in 1833, tens of thousands of meteors an hour poured from the sky, and many thought the world was ending.
What was reported
In the early hours of 13 November 1833, people across North America woke to a sky full of shooting stars, by some estimates tens of thousands an hour, all seeming to stream from one point in the constellation Leo. Many thought it was the end of the world, and some went out to pray.
The night entered folk memory; in some communities, events were dated from 'the night the stars fell'.
Explanations offered
It was the Leonid meteor shower, which happens every November as Earth passes through debris shed by Comet Tempel–Tuttle. Every 33 years or so, Earth meets a dense stream and a 'storm' results. The 1833 storm helped astronomers such as Denison Olmsted realise that meteors come from space, not from the atmosphere.
- When
- 13 November 1833
- Where
- Eastern United States
- Witnesses
- Huge numbers of people across North America
- Status
- Explained
Famous cases are real, widely reported events. Each file sets out what witnesses said and the explanations that have been offered, without taking a side.