Indian authorities stated that a meteorite killed a bus driver and injured three more people. If this is confirmed, it will be the first such case in history.
Experts said that other explanations are possible about the incident that occurred on Saturday in the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu.
The impact force of this object left a large crater on the ground, smashed the windows in the neighboring buildings and killed the driver who was walking by.
Photographs in the local media show a bluish stone, which the Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu, Jayaram Jayalalit, describes as a "meteorite." Although scientists say that this has not yet been proven.
"The meteorite fell on the territory of the engineering college ... and took the life of the bus driver of this college," the Chief Minister said in her Sunday address, causing a "shock" in the news. Professor Rajaguru from the Indian Institute of Astrophysics in Bangalore said that the fragment can be a meteorite, but more research is needed to confirm.
According to him, if the fact is confirmed, it will be the first death from a meteorite, recorded in the history of mankind.
“Most meteorites do not reach the earth’s surface, burning completely in the atmosphere,” the professor said over the phone.
“Falling on the earth’s surface is very rare, and there have not yet been deaths in history.”
Rajaguru said that the projectile hit could be a debris of a rocket or a spacecraft.
Meteors are fragments of cosmic dust and stones, which usually burn during the passage of the earth's atmosphere.
Those that do not burn completely fall to Earth. We call them meteorites.
