# Metal object crashes through N.J. home



## Johnny Thunder (Feb 24, 2006)

* Metal object crashes through N.J. home*
By CHRIS NEWMARKER, Associated Press Writer 9 minutes ago

A metal, rock-like object about the size of a golf ball and weighing nearly as much as a can of soup crashed through the roof of a Monmouth County home, and authorities on Wednesday were trying to figure out what it was.

Nobody was injured when the oblong object, weighing more than 13 ounces, crashed into the home and embedded itself in a wall Tuesday night. Federal officials sent to the scene said it was not from an aircraft.

The rough-feeling object, with a metallic glint, was displayed Wednesday by police. "There's some great interest in what we have here," said Lt. Robert Brightman. "It's rather unusual. I haven't seen anything like it in my career."

He said he hoped to have the object identified within 72 hours, but declined to name the other agencies whose help he said he had enlisted. Police received a call Wednesday morning that the metal object had punched a hole in the roof of a single-family, two-story home, damaged tiles on a bathroom floor below and then bounced, sticking into a wall.

The object was heavier than a usual metal object of that size, said Brightman, who added that no radioactivity was detected. Brightman would not disclose the address of the house or the names of the people who lived there, citing the family's desire to not talk to the media. He would only say that the couple and their adult son live in a township housing development.

Brightman said one man who lives at the home found the object at about 9 p.m. Tuesday after returning from work and hearing from his mother that something had crashed through the roof a few hours before.

The Federal Aviation Administration, which sent investigators to the town, did not know where the object came from, said spokeswoman Arlene Murray.
"It's definitely not an aircraft part," she said. "I can't speak beyond that as to what it might be."

Approximately 20 to 50 rock-like objects fall every day over the entire planet, said Carlton Pryor, a professor of astronomy at Rutgers University. "It's not all that uncommon to have rocks rain down from heaven," said Pryor, who had not seen the object that struck the Monmouth County home. "These are usually rocky or a mixture of rock and metal."

Pryor said laboratory tests would have to be conducted to determine if the object were a meteorite.


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## slightlymad (May 25, 2006)

Alien space trash any body check on trishanne?


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## spokanejoe (Sep 16, 2006)

There is no way I would relinquish my meteorite to the local cops! If is actually some space rock can you imagine how much it might be worth to say Stanford or Nasa? Who knows.....could be a piece of Pluto or Neptume.


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## Johnny Thunder (Feb 24, 2006)

*It is indeed a meteorite........*

Rutgers University geologists Jeremy Delaney, Gail Ashley and Claire Condie and Peter Elliott, an independent metallurgist who studied the object, determined it was an iron meteorite because of its density, magnetic properties, markings and coloration.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070105/ap_on_sc/fallen_object_2


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