A night of shooting stars

Thousands of people in North America who got up early on Nov. 18 were dazzled by a memorable sky show. White, yellow, blue, and green fireballs, some leaving behind smoke trails, streaked across the sky.

Sequence of images shows the evolution of a single Leonid fireball. D. Mammana

For sky watchers in the United States, it was probably the best Leonid meteor shower since the 1966 storm and is unlikely to be matched for another 3 decades.