PENSACOLA, Fla. (WEAR) -- A number of viewers took to social media about a streak of light moving through the sky last night.

WEAR News spoke with astronomer Jonathan McDowell.

He says this wasn't part of a meteor shower. Instead, he says it was a decommissioned satellite.

McDowell said a commercial imaging satellite made re-entry above New Orleans.

Videos from our viewers in Northwest Florida show the fireball making its way through our night sky.

McDowell said we weren't the only ones to notice it.

People as far as Missouri could have seen the event.

He says astronomers were tracking this satellite since it was going to come down in a three-hour window last night.

"The satellite is orbiting the earth as space junk until the atmosphere drags it down and it gets so low, that you're in orbit," Mcdowell said. "You're going 17,000 miles an hour which is no problem when you're in space. Once you get low enough that you're trying to plow through the atmosphere at that speed, you heat up and you burst into flames and melt. You see this fireball that we saw over the southeast."