BOGOTA – Authorities are investigating whether a second explosion heard on Monday in the vast area of the southwestern Colombian province of Valle, similar to one heard a day earlier in the northeast, was caused by a falling meteorite.

The explosion was heard in the municipalities of El Cairo, Versalles Toro and El Dovio, in the northern part of Valle del Cauca.

A powerful explosion was heard and then “the earth seemed to shake,” the area police commander, Col. Nelson Aceros, told reporters.

He recommended that people near the place of impact take precautions.

The emergency response network in Valle was activated to try and establish the origin of the phenomenon and the consequences, though the authorities have reported no damages.

Local residents are alarmed, and apparently people “after seeing the bright light heard an incredibly powerful explosion that shook the earth,” Versalles Mayor Jorge Hernan Gomez said, citing eyewitness accounts.

At first “we thought that it was an airplane that crashed, but that idea was dismissed,” the mayor said.

Since Sunday, meanwhile, Colombian authorities have been investigating whether an enormous celestial fireball that crossed the sky above several municipalities in the northeastern province of Santander over the weekend was a meteorite.

After checking with aviation authorities and the Colombian National Seismology Network, or RNSC, the possibilities that it was an airplane in an emergency situation or an eruption from a geological fault in the area have been discarded, Interior Ministry risk investigations chief Luz Amanda Pulido said.

Police said they had reports from homes in the rural area near the town of Piedecuesta of windows shattered by the shock wave from the blast. EFE