Officials confirm meteorite hit Wolcott home

Officials confirm meteorite hit Wolcott home

www.wfsb.com

Officials at the Yale Peabody Museum confirmed that a meteorite struck a home in Wolcott at the end of last week. "She told me and I made her repeat it like four times because I'm like, 'A rock?'" said Wendy Taylor. "'A rock came through your roof and into the house?' It just didn't make any sense."

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Related News Links:
www.nbcconnecticut.com
www.city-data.com

Related AboveTopSecret.com Discussion Threads:
Fireballs, comets and asteroids, oh my!

There were several reports by witnesses of a loud boom and light flash over Connecticut on Friday night around the same time that this rock crashed through man's home. It was said to be a baseball size rock! Police originally tried to tell the man that it may have been an airport runway rock that was caught up with a departing plane, then fell on his house because he lives nearby to an airport.

This is some scary stuff. With all the sonic booms, light flashes, and fireballs that have been reported lately, along with the Russian fireball, it was only a matter of time before someone reports a rock crashing through their home.

Keep your heads up everybody!

www.wfsb.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

reply to post by Rezlooper

Did the homeowner keep it, or did the police grab it? (I tried your source link but I tend to bounce out of links when the thing starts clicking like a geiger counter). Thanks for posting this, it's a very rare occurrence and I'd be happy to have one of them crash through my roof - as long as I knew the path it was taking and could have the option to move stuff either out of or into its path.

reply to post by Aleister


Yeah, would be nice to have a rock from space as long as it don't fall onto your head. I think in the story it said that the rock went to a museum, but then he probably gets to keep it, but I'm just guessing.

reply to post by Rezlooper


Actually, this is not a new thing. Meteorites have hit people's homes, cars and even people before:

'It Came From The Sky' - The Meteorite That Mangled The Malibu - a meteorite that smashed the rear end of a car.

The Hodges Meteorite That crashing into a house and hit a woman.

Here's a couple more incidents, including a spanish main who had a 3 pound meteor crash through his windshield, and a boy that was hit by a pea sized meteorite:

Source.

Considering that the Earth get's bombarded by more than 13,000 objects a day, I'm not surprised.

Good one

I guess this one should be added to the list of similar events hasppening lately, recently I reported here in ATS another event in Argentina, some days ago.

www.abovetopsecret.com...

Just need a few ones more to start a new doom and gloom fever........, woooow...how we miss them

no worries mate...

The earth is a BIG place covered mostly by water. Meteorites striking homes and cars are
anomalies...you've a better chance of being struck by lightening or winning the lotto twice

reply to post by Rezlooper


There's definitely a lot more of this going on then usual. I wonder what's up and in store ? Why always the east coast and Conn. of all places. Just a little weird.
But an SnF for you my cave dweller !

reply to post by Rezlooper


MUSEUM?? What are these people crazy??

That's gotta be worth tens if not hundreds of thousands of dollars for a baseball sized meteorite.....I would be selling it immediately if one came through my roof, no doubt about it

Originally posted by Chrisfishenstein
reply to post by Rezlooper

 

MUSEUM?? What are these people crazy??

That's gotta be worth tens if not hundreds of thousands of dollars for a baseball sized meteorite.....I would be selling it immediately if one came through my roof, no doubt about it

Damn right! I hate to assume things but i'm guessing the resident whos house was hit was not rich by any means, they were probably guilted into giving it over to a museum or authorities and in return allows the museum to get an increase in revenue and profit based on the patronage of those who come to see it. Once more i'm assuming you have to pay a fee to visit a museum...as i should mention i've never personally visited one.

Originally posted by eriktheawful
reply to post by Rezlooper

 

Actually, this is not a new thing. Meteorites have hit people's homes, cars and even people before:

'It Came From The Sky' - The Meteorite That Mangled The Malibu - a meteorite that smashed the rear end of a car.

The Hodges Meteorite That crashing into a house and hit a woman.

Here's a couple more incidents, including a spanish main who had a 3 pound meteor crash through his windshield, and a boy that was hit by a pea sized meteorite:

Source.

Considering that the Earth get's bombarded by more than 13,000 objects a day, I'm not surprised.

You speak so casually here that you make it sound like these occurrences happen quite often. Here is a quote from your source on the incidents that you list with dates

According to a SPACE.com article on the topic a few years, back:

On November 30, 1954, Alabama housewife Ann Hodges was taking a nap on her couch when she was awakened by a 3-pound (1.4-kilogram) meteor that crashed through the roof of her house, bounced off a piece of furniture and struck her in the hip, causing a large bruise.

On October 9, 1992, a large fireball was seen streaking over the eastern United States, finally exploding into many pieces. In Peekskill, New York, one of the pieces struck a Chevrolet automobile owned by Michelle Knapp. Knapp was not in the car at the time.

On June 21, 1994, Jose Martin of Spain was driving with his wife near Madrid when a 3-pound (1.4-kilogram) meteor crashed through his windshield, bent the steering wheel and ended up in the back seat.

In 2004, a 2,000-pound space rock bigger than a refrigerator exploded in the late-night sky over Chicago, producing a large flash and a sound resembling a detonation that woke people up. Fragments rained down on that wild Chicago night, and many were collected by residents in a northern suburb.

Along with the boy hit in the hand, that's a total of 5 known cases in the last 60 years! Not too common, actually. And the fact that this happened now, after all the other reports in recent months and the Russian bolide on top of that. It just makes it all the more interesting that this happened now.

reply to post by Rezlooper


Well in your second post on here you said:

it was only a matter of time before someone reports a rock crashing through their home.

As though this has never happened before. I was showing that yes it has.

As for it being a common thing that happens, no, not really, however I do expect to see more an more reports of things like this happening and people spread out and live more and more places around the globe. There are over 7 billion of us now, so ti would make sense that there would be an increase in not only reports of sightings, but having small meteorites that make it to the Earth's surface, come crashing into a house or a car.

As for being "mater of fact" about it.......they're rocks form space. Again, we get bombarded by a very large amount of things from space everyday.
What would you rather I do? Run around like chicken little screaming the sky is falling, build a under ground bunker and stuff me and my family into it for the rest of our lives, hoping that a big one never hits here and makes a crater?'

No thanks. The chances of me getting hit by a meteorite are something like 1 in 30,000,000 or so against. Where as the chances of me getting hit by lightning is only 1 in 700,000.

So I'll continue to live my life without being too worried about it. The increase in fireball sightings has not seemed to increase the amount of people that get hit by one. Show that and I'll get a bit more concerned. Maybe.

BTW - your article was interesting however. Glad you reported it.

reply to post by eriktheawful


I'm not saying that we should change our lives and sit around worrying about it, I agree with you there. I just thought it was remarkable that something this rare would happen only a couple of months after another rare event, the Russian explosion that injured over 1,000 people. That's all I'm pointing out. It's not meant to fearmonger, only to point out the story.

Originally posted by eriktheawful
Here's a couple more incidents, including a spanish main who had a 3 pound meteor crash through his windshield, and a boy that was hit by a pea sized meteorite:

Source.

Considering that the Earth get's bombarded by more than 13,000 objects a day, I'm not surprised.

Whilst I agree that this is not a new thing, it's widely agreed amongst researchers that the story of the German boy who was hit by a meteorite does not add up and was most likely a story made up by the boy:

>> This is a highly doubtful report that screams "hoax!"
>>
>> The described phenomena might match well the Hollywood idea of a meteorite
>> impact: but don't confirm at all to true events at a (small) meteorite
>> impact.
>>
>> For one thing, the whole "red hot able to burn at impact" is a persistent
>> myth.
>> But there is more to this story that doesn't ring through. The "crater"
>> shown in
>> the picture with the original German news report is too large to fit the
>> (very
>> small!) size of the object in question. Likewise, there is a certain time
>> interval between the meteor and arrival of the meteorite on earth, which
>> doesn't
>> match the boy's story.
>>
>> Maybe he just needed an excuse for papsi und mamsi for the burn on his
>> hand.
>>
>> - Marco
>>
>> -----
>> Dr Marco (asteroid 183294) Langbroek

Source: METEOROBS (The Meteor Observing mailing list)

More discussion of the story on a different forum here.


There are plenty more real examples of meteorites hitting property in the recent past though:

In 2004 one ended up in an Auckland family's living room (story now gone from news source).
Meteorite Crashes Through Virginia Doctor's Office in 2012.
And of course the recent Sutter's Mill meteorite, part of which hit a roof in late 2012.

I'd look for more, but I have a lot to do today.

In that case I guess we should be reinforcing our hats with something a bit tougher than tin-foil!

Seriously though, even before this thread was posted, I personally have developed a bit of a "meteor-phobia," from seeing all these reports.

He lives near an airport. Now that really makes me think terrorist space rocks bringing down an airliner could really happen. It puts a couple of things together that really shouldn't be.

Nice thing about space rock crashing through your home. You'll probably not need insurance, since the rock should pay for itself. But, an airport rock could be expensive. I'd rather sell the story of the rock from space, than support any argument the rock came from a falling plane.

Here is an update story from Hartford Courant

The first meteorite found in North America fell in Weston in 1807, according to Nicolescu. Two others hit houses in Wethersfield — one in 1971 and one in 1982 — and another meteorite fell in 1974 in Stratford, but didn't hit any buildings, he said.

Story said that this is the third meteorite to fall on a home in Connecticut history and the fifth overall rock found. Also says that the rock, a baseball size, now belongs to the homeowner. Should be a nice paycheck.

Nicolescu said this particular meteorite looks primitive and could have come from the very beginnings of our solar system. The crust tells experts that it traveled a very long way before crashing Friday night. "It doesn't look like any terrestrial rock," he said. Aside from the crust, the rock also has a light gray interior comparable to concrete, a fair amount of metal composition and exterior depressions — like thumbprints, Nicolescu said. All those are characteristic of meteorites.

Source

Something like this happened to my Grandfather a few years ago, though it didn't hit his house it landed in the front lawn. He went outside one day and saw his manicured lawn all torn up, there was about a 2 meter long area of grass that was just all peeled back, which indicates the meteorite came in the quite a low angle. Anyway he began digging around in the hole and found a baseball sized rock, which we all later agreed it must be a meteorite.

I wish this would happen to my house. Not only would the space rock bring me tons of money but I would have a cool story to tell.