A massive meteor broke up in the skies above Oxfordshire last night - leading to fears an aircraft was on fire.

One man who called Thames Valley Police shortly after midnight said he had seen flames in the sky and thought it might have been a blazing plane. Police took calls from across Oxfordshire and Berkshire about the light display.

Checks with air traffic control confirmed that it was caused by a meteor which entered the earth's atmosphere and broke up creating lights seen from Manchester to Cornwall, a police spokesman said.

"It ended up in Cornwall and got there across Reading and the M4," he added.

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