Hi has anyone heard anything about this? I just saw the story

http://news.ninemsn.com.au/article.aspx?id=296907

Very bizzare...

Nice find, don't know what to say tho, as meteorites is not exactly my specialty.

Could be affecting the drinking water maybe?

it affect the air
its 100ft wow

maybe they will be mutant after this
maybe venoms

Ya beat me to this one.
I wounder what a geiger counter would show. High radiation?

Or perhaps it put a fungus or bacteria into the air, from the ground it hit.

there is no picture of this
why so secret ???

The most likely event is that the impact knocked loose a supply of undersurface gas, or had a little of its own; or many germs that lied on the surface...
It is extreamly unlikely to be a virus carried by the meteorite, because since we'd have no antibodies to fight it, there would be a 100% death rate to people infected.

No secret here's the Picture it's with the article....:headscrat

Why are there so many of these 'little village hysteria, residents scared' stories coming out of South America?

senhaun....I'd say better news coverage on the internet

It doesn't look like a recent impact to me......and it doesn't look to close to a town to me......I'd bet there are other pollution issues in the town in question that could be causing health problems

Some extra terrestrial virus perhaps. Not unlikely... it came from out there, so who knows what it brought with it.

If it was an extra terrestrial virus the chances of it being able to reproduce inside terrestrial cells is astronomicly low. Viruses are very specialised in how the enter, reproduce, and destroy cells.

No virus just a bad smell probably toxic.

boiling water;the vapor carry the gas in the zone.
But this case is for :

Gosh look how young Mulder looks there compared to now in Californication...

I suppose yeah, the nausea being from gases is more likely.

Castle Bravo may have gotten it...maybe a piece of space junk created a hole and the damaging toxins were already in the ground and were released? Or, as it says in this article, something in the space debris mixed with something in the ground to create poisonous gas? wow...not good.

Here's the BBC's story from today on this meteorite illness:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7001897.stm

Scores ill in Peru 'meteor crash'

The crater has been spewing fetid gases, reports say
Some 600 people in Peru have required treatment after an object from space - said to be a meteorite - plummeted to Earth in a remote area, officials say.
They say the object left a deep crater after crashing down over the weekend near the town of Carancas in the Andes.

People who have visited scene have been complaining of headaches, vomiting and nausea after inhaling gases.

A team of scientists is on its way to the site to collect samples and verify whether it was indeed a meteorite.

'Afraid'

"It [the object] is buried in the earth," local resident Heber Mamani told the BBC.



"That is why we are asking for an analysis because we are worried for our people. They are afraid. A bull is dead and some other animals are already sick," he said.

The incident began on Saturday night, when people near Carancas in the Puno region, some 1,300km (800 miles) south of Lima, reported seeing a fireball in the sky coming towards them.

The object then hit the ground, leaving a 30m (98ft) wide and 6m (20ft) deep crater.

The crater spewed what officials described as fetid, noxious gases.

An engineer from the Peruvian Nuclear Energy Institute told the AFP news agency no radiation had been detected from the crater and ruled out the fallen object being a satellite.

Renan Ramirez said: "It is a conventional meteorite that, when it struck, produced gases by fusing with elements of the terrain."

The gases are believed to have affected the health of about 600 people who visited the site.

Most of the victims have been complaining of headaches, vomiting and nausea.

Honorio Campoblanco, one of Peru's leading geologists, called on the authorities to stop people going near the crash site.

Sorry about the double post.

Folks, I just went to the Cloudy Nights Sky and Telescope forum
http://www.cloudynights.com/

and some of the members there point out that this sounds more like a new volcano forming. Volcanos can produce liquid water and toxic gas and appear rather suddenly. Maybe something fell to earth and opened up an existing, subterranean volcanic vent. The photo, to me, looks okay for that idea. The Andes are plenty active, I hear.

Paricutin Volcano suddenly rose up out of a local guy's cornfield back in Michoacan in Mexico in the 40s...people couldn;t believe how fast it all happened.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Par%C3%ADcutin

Toxic gas was a huge problem when St. Helens blew in the US in 198O.

And stories report that "cinders" have been found.

This story will be interesting to follow.

Oh well i was kinda hoping it was the Blob....:laugh:

sg...good find....its more likely a volcanic vent....(it doesn't look like an impact)....and besides impacts usually don't emit toxic gases unless they land in a superfund site...or a third world country

On the news last night they were saying that it is most probably volcanic...but they won't know for sure until a team of scientist's get there....

Fen....that seems far more likely.....let us know what you find