Falling Ice From The Sky

CFNEWS13
Jan. 31, 2007

Here is an interesting one for insurance claim adjustors. A block of ice literally fell from the sky and crushed a car in Hillsborough County.

A neighbor was outside at the time and saw the chunk come crashing down on the Mustang.

The neighbor saved most of the ice and put it in his freezer.

No reports yet on where this mysterious ice might have come from but many in that neighborhood say they are keeping an eye on the sky.

Strangely, this is not an isolated happening. On April 9, 2006, in Oakland, California a solid block of ice that fell from the sky, crashed into earth and left behind a three-foot hole in the grass. Lt. Charles Glass of the Oakland Fire Hazardous Materials Team said the ice was pure water. "It didn't come from a toilet on a plane or anything like that."

April 15, 2006, a chunk of ice the size of a microwave oven plunged out of a cloudless sky into the San Bernardino County town of Loma Linda, California. The ice punched through the metal roof of a recreation center, leaving a hole up to 2 1/2 feet wide, and then fragmented into opaque, brilliant white chunks, one as big as a bowling ball.

August 15, 2005, a huge chunk of ice crashed through the roof of a home in Fontana California. "The ice does not appear to be of the "blue ice" variety that usually falls from airplane toilets," the local NBC-4 News reported.

January 27, 2007 in Ancona, Itlay, the local magistrate was called to investigate the report of a man who was struck on the head by a 1-kilogram (2.2 pound) chunk of ice that apparently fell from the sky.

In Spain within a 10-day period beginning on January 8, 2007, more than a dozen large chunks of ice fell in various locations around Spain, some reportedly as big as basketballs and weighing as much as 9 pounds. The first explanation they offered was that it might be frozen waste jettisoned from over flying aircraft. Analysis of the ice in both Spain and Italy concluded, however, that the ice lacked the coloring and microorganisms that would be present in jet waste.

June 26, 1985, in Hartford, Connecticut a 1500-pound hunk of ice mysteriously dropped from the sky and smashed into a backyard fence.

Legends about plunging ice go back for centuries. They did not begin to receive serious scientific attention until a few years ago.

Some weather experts believe the ice is a weather anomaly called "megacryometeors," with mega standing for "big" and "cryo' for ice. Megacryometeors are unexplained ice balls that fall from the sky and usually weigh between 25 to 30 pounds.

Jesus Martinez-Frias of the Planetary Geology Laboratory in Madrid and his colleagues have collected reports of 40 cases around the world since 1999 of puzzling falling ice.

Martinez-Frias hypothesizes that the ice forms in the upper atmosphere by a process similar to the formation of hail inside thunderstorms but without a thunderstorm.