In 2015 Curtin University, in conjunction with ThoughtWorks, won three awards for the mobile application 'Fireballs in the Sky': National iAward Winner, Education Category | National BHERT Winner, Best Community Engagement Award | Finalist for the WA Premier’s Science Awards.

Curtin University has a mission to change minds, lives and the world through leadership, innovation and excellence in teaching and research. The Science and Engineering Faculty is committed to improving people's understandings of planetary science research and enhancing their attitudes towards science.

Fireballs in the Sky (FITS) is a Curtin University innovation initiative, aiming to get Australians involved in the ‘Desert Fireball Network’ research project in a fun and engaging way. Curtin partnered with ThoughtWorks to deliver a mobile application for both iOS and Android that allows members of the public to report their own meteorite sightings.

While it’s not everyday that fireballs fall from the sky, a focus of the project was to create an app that people were compelled to use, even when there are no meteorite sightings to report. The app is a gateway to a rich set of information, including other sightings, news and events and a picture gallery featuring images from the Desert Fireball Network cameras. All this provides a compelling experience for citizen scientists.

The app allows users to accurately reconstruct their meteorite sighting’s trajectory and key attributes. The team achieved this through extensive use of smartphone sensors, a custom star map with heads-up display, and cool particle animations. The native implementations also created a great user experience tailored to the different smartphone platforms.