On really clear nights if you look up into the sky for a while, sooner or later you will see a brief streak of light, usually less than half a second in duration, it looks like something on fire, falling. Thats what it is actually, something from space, drawn by earth's gravity and incinerated in the upper atmosphere due to friction because it had been traveling at great speed. If it is a piece of an old comet or asteroid, or a random space pebble or piece of ice, then the luminous streak is called a meteor. But its just as likely that it is a scrap of man made material, launched minutes or decades ago, making a fiery return from space to the delight of skywatchers who think they are seeing a meteor. There have been hundreds of rocket launches in the last fifty or so years so its highly likely that at least some and possibly most of the "meteors" seen on an average night are actually pieces coming back. Are they still called "meteors"?