A meteorite is believed to have landed in the Perth Hills area on Monday morning. A bright light in the night sky has been reported by dozens of people in Perth and Western Australia’s South West.

A Gidgegannup resident, Angela Whife, called ABC radio to report that she saw a meteor winking out over her property mid-morning. She reported that she went searching for it in a paddock on her property at Gidgegannup, which is 40km out of Perth in Western Australia.

A number of Perth news crews went to help by 11am. The meteorite that was seen across the sky in Perth was believed to have flashed at about 9.30am. However, Whife said that she didn’t find any trace of the meteor.

Several drivers captured images of the meteor coming down on their devices. Phil Bland, a Curtin University geology professor and meteorite enthusiast said that the meteorite would have been a big chunk of some asteroid, which burnt bright enough to be seen in daylight.

According to him, it probably about the size of a basketball when it entered the atmosphere and if it did not burn up in the atmosphere and possibly landed on Earth, it probably is about the size of a grapefruit.

However, Bland said that it is unlikely that anyone actually saw it hit the ground as meteorites usually slowed from an entry speed of 20km a second to something closer to free-fall about 15km above the planet.

Bland said that the meteorite would be cold, blackened, slightly brassy and much heavier than an ordinary rock and is likely to be found by a farmer or a bushwalker sometime in the future.

He said, “That would be wonderful if they did. There’s great scientific value when we record these things, particularly if you know where in the solar system it came from”.