The first pieces of meteorite to be found in the UK for three decades have been discovered in the Cotswolds according to Sky News.
Scientists have described the find as “incredibly exciting” and confirmed that the rocks found scattered around the town of Winchcombe are pieces of a very rare type of meteorite, the first of its kind to ever be found in the UK.
The discovery was made after a fireball meteor was seen shooting through the night sky across the UK and parts of northern Europe on Sunday 28 February.
Experts studied videos that were captured of the fireball and estimated if meteorites had fallen to earth their likely landing zone was an area north of Cheltenham in Gloucestershire.
Residents were urged to check their gardens and neighbourhoods. Scientists received a call from a family who had heard a thud in the night on their driveway, and gone out to discover a pile of black, powdery rock.
Dr Ashley King, a fellow at the department of Earth Sciences at the Natural History Museum, was among those who travelled to recover it so it could be carefully analysed and confirmed as a meteorite.
“I’m absolutely stunned to be honest, and it really hasn’t sunk in at all,” Dr King told Sky News.
The last time a meteorite was discovered in the UK was in 1991, when a rock fell into a garden at Glatton near Peterborough, while the homeowner Arthur Pettifor was gardening.
Image source: Sky News
