Mystery noise heard around New Jersey on Tuesday morning

What was the loud noise people across New Jersey are posting about on their social media they heard on Tuesday morning?

The noise was heard around 11:15 a.m. and described by callers to New Jersey 101.5 as sounding like thunder or a truck that went over a large bump.

Comments were posted to the Tri-State Weather Facebook page reporting the noise in Bloomfield, Colts Neck, East Hanover, Hazlet, Highlands, Neptune, Paterson and Woodbridge.

"I thought it was thunder at first and realized it was too sunny for that! So then I figured it was a big truck because of the road work that's been going on in town," one person from Highlands wrote on Facebook.

"Work in Hackensack and I didn’t feel anything but heard what sounded like a dumpster being dumped into a garbage truck type of sound," another person wrote.

Earthquake? Flight training?

The U.S. Geological Survey does not have any reports of an earthquake in New Jersey or anywhere on the East Coast. There were no thunderstorms on radar at the time.

A spokesman for the Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst told New Jersey 101.5 there was no unusual training at the base.

Little Egg Harbor police reported that "activity" was scheduled at the New Jersey Air National Guard's Warren Grove Air to Ground Range in Tuckerton between 10 a.m. and 11 a.m. The ANG on Tuesday afternoon did not respond to an inquiry from New Jersey 101.5.

One possible explanation is a fireball that passed over the area north of New York City, according to the American Meteor Society.

"When sounds are heard from a fireball, this indicates that some fragments survived down to the lower atmosphere and may have left small remnants of the original fireball on the ground," AMS spokesman Robert Lunsford told New Jersey 101.5 in a statement.

Report a correction 👈 | 👉 Contact our newsroom