Huge meteor cuts through sky above Florida

Concerned Florida citizens thought they were witnessing a real-life War of the Worlds as a high fireball lit up the night sky on Tuesday.

The exploding object from space was captured on police dashcam.

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Citizens from North Port, Venice and Tampa all called police after they saw the fire in the sky.

Scientists say it was a meteor entering the atmosphere at 40,000 miles per hour.

So, just how big was it? Astronomer Mark Hamergrand said: "To light up the night time's sky, that's big. It's as massive as a car, even more than that, so that's a big chunk of rock."

The meteor travelled right over downtown Tampa at around 11.15pm and it's believed to have landed off the coast, in the Gulf of Mexico before midnight.