Last night, several Los Angeles residents witnessed what appeared to be a meteor crashing through the night sky. Here, its red flames clashed beautifully with the black backdrop which made it easy to see from various parts of the city. As seen in the photo below, this looked like a meteor which was an easy mistake to assume. However, it was actually something very different.

Instead, this was the launch of SpaceX’s Falcon satellite which took place at 6:13 p.m. at the Vandenberg Space Force Base northwest of Santa Barbara. Due to its close proximity, it’s not surprising that the rocket was visible in parts of Los Angeles.

This was also accompanied by a sonic boom that certain residents also claimed to have heard. Unsurprisingly, if you weren’t aware of SpaceX you could easily jump to the wrong conclusions. To put it simply, Starlink satellites are deployed into the sky via a series of carefully orchestrated rocket launches. The satellites are first assembled and tested on the ground, then loaded onto a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket.

Once the rocket is launched, it releases the satellites into low-Earth orbit, where they use their own propulsion systems to reach their final positions. While this is a fairly rare occurrence, it’s not the first time this has happened. It also means more Starlink satellites will now be visible which will probably lead to more confused sightings from the public.