The limit of the military detectors is about -1 8M for fireballs. The number of meteors goes down inversely with increasing mass, so very bright fireballs are rare. We note a magnitude estimate when possible, and in all cases state whether the object is brighter than, about the same as, or fainter than the full moon. The colour of the fireball is noted. The human eye loses colour vision before total vision, which is why all faint meteors appear white.
Bright fireballs display a range of colours throughout the spectrum.
One often has atmospheric reddening effects of meteors which are low to the horizon. The speed of a meteor is an important criterion in whether a meteorite will result. Bright fireballs frequently fragment under the combined influences of thermal stresses, shock waves, and differential aerodynamic pressure. We note the fragmentation, if any, with a qualitative description. In both cases a description of the sound, and the delay time is noted.