November 30 – Anniversary of the only documented case of a meteorite hitting a human!

nPostednon November 30, 2013

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nAlabamanresident Ann Hodges was just minding her own business, taking annafternoon nap, on this date in 1954. n

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nWhennsuddenly – CRASH! – a meteorite bulleted through her roof,nbounced off of a radio (thank goodness, this was in the days whennradios were large pieces of wooden furniture!), and hit her as shenlay on the couch.

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nShenwas badly bruised where the meteorite hit her—but she was basicallynfine, and of course the bruise healed.

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Thenmeteor was so bright in the sky, as it burned through the atmosphere,nthat people in three different states saw it as a fireball in the skyneven though it was daytime! Some witnesses reported hearing annexplosion or boom, which was probably an air blast or shock wavencreated by the chunk of space rock pushing through the air at such antremendous speed.

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n(Bynthe way, did you notice that a chunk of space rock is called a meteornwhen it is streaking through the atmosphere? The chunks that arenlarge enough to reach the ground (most burn all the way up in thenatmosphere) are called meteorites once they make impact. Andnwhen they are still floating around in space, they are sometimesncalled meteoroids!)

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ThenU.S. Air Force sent out a helicopter to take the meteorite fromnHodges. (I guess they were worried it might be a piece of some sort ofnSoviet technology.)

nHodges and her husband were briefly famous—and offers to buy the meteorite poured in from all over—so they hired a lawyer tonget it back from the government. The owner of the house that thenHodges rented felt that she should be able to own thenmeteorite, and sell it to cover the cost of the repairs. Finally, anyear after the meteorite impact, the government awarded ownership tonAnn Hodges. n

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nBynthat time, however, people were “over” the excitement, and Hodgesncouldn’t find a buyer. So she donated it to the local university’s museum of natural history. n

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nIt’snpretty cool because the meteorite is commonly called the Hodgesnmeteorite!

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nBynthe way…

nInmentioned in my title that Hodges was the only human to be documentednto have been hit by a meteorite. However, there is a written butnunconfirmed report that a man in what is now Italy died after beingnhit by a meteorite in 1677, and in 1992 a really tiny fragment of anmeteorite hit a boy in Uganda—after being slowed down by a tree. SonI am not entirely sure why the Hodges meteorite is called “the onlyndocumented case of a meteorite hitting a human”! n

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nAlsonon this date:

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