The likely remnants of a Russian rocket trailing across the night sky has put on a late night show for people across Australia's south-east.
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The blazing light trail was spotted and filmed in Melbourne but reports also came in from across Victoria and Broken Hill in NSW.
The Australian Space Agency said it had determined the flashes of light were "likely the remnants of a Russian Soyuz-2 rocket re-entering the Earth's atmosphere".
This theory had been earlier shared online by US astronomer Jonathan McDowell.
"We have determined the flashes of light seen across Melbourne skies overnight were likely the remnants of a Russian Soyuz-2 rocket re-entering the Earth's atmosphere," the agency said.
The ASA said the rocket had launched earlier in the evening on August 7 and placed a global navigation satellite into orbit, according to Russian authorities.
"This launch was notified and remnants of the rocket were planned to safely re-enter the atmosphere into the ocean off the south-east coast of Tasmania," the agency said.
"We will continue to monitor the outcomes of this re-entry with our government partners."
Space junk sightings becoming more common
ANU astrophysicist Dr Brad Tucker earlier said the characteristics amounted to space junk re-entering Earth's atmosphere.
"What gives us the clues as to space junk is it's slow moving compared to meteors, the colour as well and then as it starts to re-enter you can see bits of it breaking off," he said.
"This is all stuff that we saw in the video and lots of people saw all across Victoria."
Dr Tucker said bits of space junk may have fallen and landed on the ground but majority probably ended up in the ocean.
"Some people may be finding it. There'll be things like scarring and charring on it, there'll be a few other features it may have - so something for people to look forward to as the situation evolves."
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But he warned if people think they have found bits of space junk they should not touch it.
"We don't know what it is so what material it's made up of," he said.
"My rule with space junk is, it's like Australian animals: don't touch it if you don't know what you're doing."
The phenomenon used to be rare, Dr Tucker said, but doesn't feel that way anymore.
"We had a big incident last year over NSW where something like this was seen during a Saturday morning and then bits of it were found on the ground all across NSW," he said.
"There was a bit of rocket booster that washed up in WA a couple weeks ago, so it is happening more and more."
