It Fell Out of the Sky in Bayonne
We’ve seen meteors in New Jersey before, but this is something else. This crashed through a roof in Bayonne and people thought is was space junk, or part of a commercial jet.
The folks at local news radio 1010 WINS explain:
Object That Fell Through Bayonne Roof Identified
BAYONNE, N.J. (AP) — It didn’t take a rocket scientist to solve the mystery of what it was that fell through the roof of a Bayonne home Tuesday, though some had wondered if it was part of a space craft.Federal Aviation Administration spokesman Jim Peters on Wednesday said the mystery metal was part of a commercial woodchipper.
For most of a day, the FAA, New Jersey Transit officials and others were scratching their heads about what the hunk of gray metal may have been.
The man who lives in the house was watching television Tuesday when he heard a crash and saw a cloud of dust. In the next room, he found a hunk of gray metal, 3{ inches by 5 inches, with two hexagonal holes in it.
Experts said it was manmade, but couldn’t identify it.
New Jersey Transit has railroad tracks about 100 feet from the house, but spokesman Dan Stessel said the object isn’t something that would have flown off a train.
FAA officials said it wasn’t a part that would have fallen from a plane headed into or out of nearby Newark Liberty International Airport.
A NASA scientist said it did not appear to be part of a spacecraft.
Peters said that when an FAA inspector took the piece back to his office Tuesday afternoon to work on the mystery, a colleague recognized the piece.
The same part from a different machine had caused similar confusion — though it did not get any publicity — last year. Peters said the inspector could not remember where in New Jersey the other one fell.
The part came from the grinder of a woodchipper. Peters said the piece moves very fast and, apparently, can launch into the air if something goes wrong. "Maybe we can use it as a new weapon,” he joked.
Bayonne is located just south of Jersey City and lies across Newark Bay and the Newark Liberty International Airport. The city even has it’s own bridge, to Staten Island.
