Yesterday was a weird weather day in St. Louis. After a mild weekend, with sunshine and temperatures close to 70 degrees on Sunday, winter roared in with a vengeance. Rain and plummeting temperatures soon turned to sleet and then snow — including hamster-sized flakes — yesterday morning and afternoon. By evening, the skies were clearing, but the temperature had dipped down into the ‘teens.

Record lows were set or tied at St. Louis & Quincy yesterday, November 11th, while Columbia & St. Louis broke previous record daily snowfall. For today, November 12th, all 3 climate sites broke record lows. Also, St. Louis has a new record snow depth. #RecordLows #RecordSnowfall pic.twitter.com/KcbLK2agMg

— NWS St. Louis (@NWSStLouis) November 12, 2019

I didn’t even bother trying to leave my office until after 6:00 pm, figuring there was no sense rushing out to sit in traffic. Particularly since I was low on gas and knew I’d need to fill up on the way home. Thankfully, with yesterday being Veterans’ Day, there was less traffic on the roads, to begin with. Still took me an hour-and-a-half to get home, though.

By that time, I was pretty beat. I heated up some leftovers and flopped down on the couch to watch some Monday Night Football — but then flipped to Dancing With the Stars, which I’ve not watched all season but, since I wrote about it yesterday, felt compelled to check out. (READ: Don, Jr., Gets Spicy – Takes Jab at Dems.)

Around 9:00 pm, I started seeing murmurs on “Next Door” and social media about a loud BOOM! and flash of light. Neither of which I’d noticed for some reason. Initial rumors were of transformers blowing but soon came the news that, no, this was a meteor! In fact, last night, we were witness to the Taurid Meteor Shower.

Around 8:50 p.m. the Fox 2 phones lit up as viewers call about hearing a loud boom or seeing a bright flash of blue light in the western St. Louis Metro area.  Viewers reported sightings from St. Peters, O’Fallon Missouri, and St. Louis County.

Meteorologist Glenn Zimmerman says it was most likely a meteor from the Taurid Meteor Shower burning up as it entered Earth’s atmosphere.

There were tons of social media posts with great video (some caught on roof cams or doorbell cams.)

I was watching an @EarthCam camera from St. Louis, Missouri about 30 minutes ago and saw a #meteor! pic.twitter.com/PVAvIGlALF

— David Vergel (@DavidVergel97) November 12, 2019

Meteor flying overhead from east to west in O'Fallon, MO this evening just west of St. Louis. #stlwx #mowx pic.twitter.com/0IX2fppoEd

— Tom Stolze (@ofallonweather) November 12, 2019

Pretty cool. But I have to wonder – was this just SMOD toying with us?