At about 2:06 p.m. on Saturday, May 30, 2026, people across eastern Massachusetts and Rhode Island heard a loud double boom and felt their buildings shake. Police departments were flooded with calls. Watertown police posted that the origin was unknown. Needham police joked that it was maybe an earthquake, maybe a sonic boom, and either way they were done for the day. The state public safety office reported an audible boom and ground tremors but no threat.

It came a day after a mysterious sonic boom startled people in South Carolina, and speculation ran wild. The answer came within hours. NOAA’s GOES-19 weather satellite had recorded a flash over the coast with its lightning mapper, though there was no lightning. NASA said a meteor traveling about 75,000 mph had fragmented roughly 40 miles above northeastern Massachusetts and southeastern New Hampshire, releasing energy equivalent to about 300 tons of TNT. The American Meteor Society estimated the rock at about 3 feet across.

Clouds hid it from most people in Massachusetts, but the fireball was seen in full daylight from Delaware to Montreal, and a driver in Rome, New York, caught it on dashcam. NASA received more than 70 reports from nine states and two Canadian provinces.

NASA later said any surviving fragments fell into Cape Cod Bay, in about 100 feet of water. Daytime fireballs bright enough to notice happen over any given populated area only once every few years.