In what is said to be a rare event, a woman in France was hit by a meteorite while having coffee with a friend on her terrace, Newsweek reported earlier citing a report by local newspaper Les Dernières Nouvelles d’Alsace.
Poom and hit!
Narrating the incident to the local newspaper, the woman said she heard a big ‘poom’ sound from the roof next to them. At that exact moment, she felt a “shock” on her ribs. At first she thought it was an animal, such as a bat. The woman and her friend at first thought that the meteorite was a piece of cement which is applied to the ridge tiles. “But it didn’t have any colour,” she added.
The woman later took the rock to a roofer for examination. She was then told that it was not made from cement but looked like a meteorite. She later showed the object to geologist Thierry Rebmann.
Geologist says it could be a meteorite
Rebmann told the newspaper that the rock seemed to have a mixture of iron and silicon and could be a meteorite. All the pieces of the meteorite which have been recovered together weigh almost 4 ounces. The geologist added the phenomenon of people being hit by a meteorite is extremely rare.
“It’s very rare, in our temperate environments to find them…They merge with other elements. On the other hand, in a desert environment, we can find them more easily,” Rebmann added.
The first confirmed case of a meteorite hitting a person directly reportedly occurred in the US nearly 70 years ago. In November 1954, an 8-pound stony meteorite hit Ann Hodges of Sylacauga in Alabama. Ann was left with severe bruising.