Great-grandmother has lucky escape from very unlucky mishap (grazed by meteorite)

AFP on Yahoo ^ | 8/18/04 | AFP - London

[NormsRevenge]

LONDON (AFP) - Most people would think they were supremely unlucky to be struck by a falling meteorite while out in their back garden.

Yet great-grandmother Pauline Aguss is just grateful the rock only grazed her arm.

The 76-year-old was hit by a swiftly-falling fragment of rock while hanging out washing in her garden in the county of Suffolk, the Sun newspaper reported in its Wednesday edition.

If the golf ball-sized fragment is confirmed as originating from space, Aguss will be the first Briton ever known to have been struck by a meteorite.

Aguss told the newspaper that she had felt a sudden sharp pain in her arm, and her husband found a small chunk of metallic brown rock where she had just been standing.

"I couldn't believe it when Jack found the rock on the grass. I was so relieved it hadn't hit me on the head. I could have been killed," she told the paper.

A spokesman for the British Astronomical Association said it was "quite possible" the rock concerned was a meteorite, while adding that the chances of being struck were generally "tiny".

[NormsRevenge]

A scientist examines a meteorite that was discovered in a garden near Freising. Great-grandmother Pauline Aguss was hit by a meteorite while hanging out washing in her garden in Suffolk.(AFP/DDP/File)

[NormsRevenge]

Pass the clothespins, Jack.

It's only a flesh wound.

[Larry Lucido]

Looks like a kidney stone I once had.

[mdmathis6]

It looks like a chunk of broken asphalt...something that large surviving should created quite a bang and noise in order to have survived. Maybe some neighbor kid messing around?

[neal1960]

Does this mean shes entitled to a Purple Heart? J/K

[AngrySpud]

Also, wouldn't something that large have left an impact crater?

[eccentric]

Aguss told the newspaper that she had felt a sudden sharp pain in her arm, and her husband found a small chunk of metallic brown rock where she had just been standing.

It would have been hot when it landed, probably red-hot, not brown.

[TaxRelief]

Not hot, it cools very rapidly.

[beezdotcom]

Also, wouldn't something that large have left an impact crater?

It would if it hit the earth at umpteen thousand miles an hour. However, if it was part of something larger that fragmented in the outer atmosphere, bled off speed and slowed to terminal velocity before hitting, it could just fall. They find meteorite chunks lying on the surface all the time. Here's one example.

[Lockbar]

This is worth money. Watch the cops pull a trick on her like they did to some old people here in Chicago last year. A good size space rock smashed in the roof of some old people's house. They freaked out and called the cops. The cops pulled a deal like "oh, this is very important yeah, thats the ticket! The law says we have to turn is over to some very important scientists, yeah, scientists, yeah, thats it!"

After the old folks found out that the meteorite could be worth perhaps several thousand $$ on the collectors market, they called up the Police dept. and wanted the rock back. "Um Gee, its kind of disappeared, yeah, thats it, now go back to bed, yeah, thats it, go get some sleep".

[Calvin Locke]

Not hot, it cools very rapidly.

Obviously, she and her significant other never saw any movies about touching meteorites.

"The Blob" comes to mind. And a Stephen King vignette.