Meteorite makes village ill? Yikes!

www.theage.com.au...

Villagers in southern Peru were struck by a mysterious illness after a meteorite made a fiery crash to Earth in their area, regional authorities said today.

Around midday Saturday, villagers were startled by an explosion and a fireball that many were convinced was an airplane crashing near their remote village, in the high Andes department of Puno in the Desaguadero region, near the border with Bolivia.

"Residents complained of headaches and vomiting brought on by a "strange odour", local health department official Jorge Lopez told Peruvian radio RPP.

Seven policemen who went to check on the reports also became ill and had to be given oxygen before being hospitalised, Lopez said.

Rescue teams and experts were dispatched to the scene where the meteorite had left a crater 30m wide and six metres deep, said local official Marco Limache.

"Boiling water started coming out of the crater and particles of rock and cinders were found nearby. Residents are very concerned," he said.

This is frightening stuff, right out of late 50's science fiction. If a microbe from space were capable of affecting human biology, it could very well spell the end of the World as we know it. Forget SARS, Ebola, any of the plagues, or bird flu... This could be a real Captain Trips.

Let's hope it is more of a gas release thing as opposed to biological. Very unusual. I wonder what the proximity of villagers were to the event.

Very strange. I wonder if the guys they brought to the hospital got immidiately better or if they are still ill? I guess it could be an odor thing, but there are gases and things that when you inhale them give you a headache and/or sick, so it doesn't have to be a biological thing.

Water? interesting.
Lets hope its not something big? Would like to hear more about this.

Either radioactive or biological substances were in the meteorite.

I am a little curious as to how the dimension of impact crater is 30 m wide yet only 6m deep. Lots of variables of course, surface composition of impact area and composition of meteor. Perhaps cyanide poisoning? They did mention police were able to be evac'd to hospital after receiving O2. So I'm hoping its the gases route. Trying to jog my chemistry days as to what gas chemicals boil at room temp. I got nothin' but I'll google.

reply to post by vincebaby


Agreed. It's almost got to be radioactive elements inside of either the earth or the meteorite that have caused these people to get sick. The boiling water could be a result of a magma chamber not too far below the surface of the earth. Interesting story though.

TheBorg

Who says its a piece of rock,
couldnt it be a piece of space junk?
Nasa often says to aviod as it could possibly be radioactive.

Very interesting either way, sort of thing id love to see with my own eyes.

This Article Which includes a picture refers to "remains of animals" and "chips of lead and silver" found in the area..And This Article Says test of the soil and water will take several days..

Originally posted by Agit8dChop
Who says its a piece of rock,
couldnt it be a piece of space junk?
Nasa often says to aviod as it could possibly be radioactive.

Very interesting either way, sort of thing id love to see with my own eyes.

most of the space junk comming back to earth is beeing tracked as far as I know so they would know where it hits and what it was .

I would go with the theory of radioactive elements poisoning the villagers and the police . But if that would be true there is another concern , radioactive elements would have to emit a very very high ammount of radioactivity (erm spelling?) in order to make the police feel the effect so quick. Usually it takes some time for the radioactive elements to start doing harm on the body.

Edit: someone made a very good comment below the article , if those elements get into the local waterways this could pollute much more than just the surrounding area.

[edit on 18-9-2007 by Thill]

I'm leaning towards radiation, but as others have said, it is unusual how fast the symptoms developed.

Interesting.

has any suggested zombies? would be interesting. i call dibs on superwall-mart guns, food, and garden equipment.


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[edit on 18-9-2007 by elevatedone]

Wouldn't be ironic that the very thing that probably brought life to Earth would end up destroying it. Space organisms can't be controlled. Any basketball sized object can bring it to Earth at anytime. Let's hope this passes. If it starts to spread, we're in trouble. Keep your ears to the ground.

I would like to see pictures and a CDC investigation started though.

Originally posted by Agit8dChop
Who says its a piece of rock,
couldnt it be a piece of space junk?
Nasa often says to aviod as it could possibly be radioactive.

Very interesting either way, sort of thing id love to see with my own eyes.

Those were my thoughts, did they actually see it and inspect what fell or was it just a crater?

Originally posted by eagledriver
Wouldn't be ironic that the very thing that probably brought life to Earth would end up destroying it.

It wouldn't be the first time eagle.

Has anyone heard anything on the news about this, I have not.

I would think this to be of interest to every country.

Originally posted by observe50
Has anyone heard anything on the news about this, I have not.

I would think this to be of interest to every country.

In a normal world it would, but we are more interested in Britney Spears...

Originally posted by Copernicus

Originally posted by observe50
Has anyone heard anything on the news about this, I have not.

I would think this to be of interest to every country.

In a normal world it would, but we are more interested in Britney Spears...

so true .. Why do we even bother trying to show anything to the masses Unless Britney or Lopez shrink and become grey nobody is going to care anyway :/

Originally posted by observe50
Has anyone heard anything on the news about this, I have not.

I would think this to be of interest to every country.

I know at least Yahoo news covered it this morning:
news.yahoo.com...

maybe this is a new biological, chemical, radioactive, weapons test of some kind ?.
either way its very interesting mystery for now.