Norwegian skydiver nearly struck by meteorite

[Dave Lane]

One summer day in 2012, Anders Helstrup and several other members of Oslo Parachute Club jumped from a small plane that had taken off from Østre Æra Airport in Hedmark.

Helstrup, wearing a wing suit and with two cameras fixed to his helmet, released his parachute. On the way down he realised something was happening.

“I got the feeling that there was something, but I didn’t register what was happening,” Helstrup explained to NRK.no.

Read article in Norwegian
Immediately after landing, he looked through the film from the jump, which clearly showed that something did happen.

Something that looks like a stone hurtles past Helstrup – clearing him by only a few metres.

Search party in the forest
Later that day, Helstrup returned to Oslo. But he could not stop thinking about his strange experience, so he took time off from work to go back to the Rena area for a couple of days to look for the stone – but with no luck.

Anders Helstrup - Anders Helstrup in his wing suit. - Foto: Roger Myren / NRK
Anders Helstrup in his wing suit.
FOTO: ROGER MYREN / NRK
“We continued the search during the summer. I got my girlfriend, family and friends to join the project. We searched the forest and kept looking."

By then, Helstrup had already formed the idea that it was a meteorite that flew past him.

“When we stopped the film, we could clearly see something that looked like a stone. At first it crossed my mind that it had been packed into a parachute, but it’s simply too big for that.”

Meteorite experts get involved
Eventually Helstrup contacted the Natural History Museum in Oslo.

“The film caused a sensation in the meteorite community. They seemed convinced that this was a meteorite, perhaps I was the one who was the most sceptical.”

Now Helstrup suddenly had a whole flock of meteorite enthusiasts following him. They analysed and triangulated and narrowed down the search area.

In the summer of 2012 Helstrup and his helpers had begun searching an area of one and a half square kilometres. Today, the area has been limited to 100 times a hundred meters, but that’s big enough – especially when you’re not really sure what a meteorite looks like.

“I found a stone which I thought was a meteorite and took it to the museum. They just fell about laughing,” Helstrup revealed.

“It can’t be anything else”
Although Helstrup is still not completely convinced that it was indeed a meteorite that flew past him, the experts are in no doubt.

“It can’t be anything else. The shape is typical of meteorites – a fresh fracture surface on one side, while the other side is rounded,” said geologist Hans Amundsen.

He explained that the meteorite had been part of a larger stone that had exploded perhaps 20 kilometres above Helstrup.

Amundsen thinks he can make out coloured patches in the stone, and believes that in that case it may be a breccia – a common type of meteorite rock.

http://www.nrk.no/viten/skydiver-nea...ite-1.11646757

[-King-]

That's an unpleasant language.

[Pitt Gorilla]

Girl you looks good.

[BWillie]

Surprised meteors dont hit planes more often. Glad they dont. Still scary to think about

[Baby Lee]

Originally Posted by BWillie

Surprised meteors dont hit planes more often. Glad they dont. Still scary to think about

Don't know what squiks me out more, reports of meteorites the size of Greyhound buses coming our way, or buffalo beating feet out of Yosemite.

[mikey23545]

Hey Lane, do you know if that skydiver is an atheist?

[Rain Man]

Originally Posted by Baby Lee

Don't know what squiks me out more, reports of meteorites the size of Greyhound buses coming our way, or buffalo beating feet out of Yosemite.

The meteors have just as good a chance of hitting a Middle Eastern country as they do us, so there's a chance that a giant meteor could do some good in the long run. I'm looking right down the barrel of the Yosemite volcano.

And by the way, this is an amazingly cool thread.

[Otter]

Originally Posted by planetdoc

the reporter girl is a cutie.

too fat!



/Omaha

[HonestChieffan]

All faked but sure has the star boy crowd excited.

[CoMoChief]

Originally Posted by fan4ever

Thank God he wasn't hurt.

It would have made a much better story if he had been though.

[CoMoChief]

Originally Posted by Baby Lee

Don't know what squiks me out more, reports of meteorites the size of Greyhound buses coming our way, or buffalo beating feet out of Yosemite.

animals have that weird extra sense that can tell when bad shit's about to happen, or when a major storm is coming. If they're getting the **** out, I probably would have the strong urge to do so as well.

[KcMizzou]

Originally Posted by -King-

That's an unpleasant language.

I think it's Klingon.

[UL Washington]

This takes a 9 minute video? Just show the applicable few seconds and end it.

[htismaqe]

Originally Posted by Baby Lee

Don't know what squiks me out more, reports of meteorites the size of Greyhound buses coming our way, or buffalo beating feet out of Yosemite.

You do know that the last time it erupted it deposited a foot of ash almost all the way to the Nebraska/Iowa border, right?

[Baby Lee]

Originally Posted by htismaqe

You do know that the last time it erupted it deposited a foot of ash almost all the way to the Nebraska/Iowa border, right?

Bill Bryson schooled me soundly on the implications of a Yosemite eruption.

EDIT: It occurs to me that I might have overused an emoji to tilt the mood too far in the opposite direction.

Those truly are things that squik me when I let my imagination run wild, not things that I am deriding as absolutely preposterous.

The odds are long, incredibly long, phenomenally long, but meteorites do travel the heavens and Yosemite will erupt some day.

[htismaqe]

Originally Posted by Baby Lee

Bill Bryson schooled me soundly on the implications of a Yosemite eruption.

He's originally from Des Moines...