Leonids in 98 or 99 were spectacular. Camped on top of a dune in mungo np and lay in our swags watching fireballs rip across the night sky. Lit up the ground.
And I was airborne and saw the Hyabusa re entry over Woomera a few years back. That was a spacecraft with a story. The NASA DC8 that came over sure had some toys in it. Optically perfect glass cabin windows.
If you think how ignorant the general population is about aviation (media too ) there is a similar level of ignorance regarding astronomy.
There were media references to this being an asteroid or a comet. That's as bad a clanger as a Boeing Airbus 747.