Meteorite hits Cambodia, sparks fires
Wednesday, January 26, 2005 Posted: 12:33 PM EST (1733 GMT)
PHNOM PENH, Cambodia (Reuters) -- A 4.5 kg (10 lb) meteorite which landed in a former Khmer Rouge zone of northwest Cambodia started fires across rice fields and prayers from villagers who saw it as a divine omen of peace.
"Some farmers are angry with the rock because it caused fires and destroyed several hundred hectares of their paddy fields," said Sok Sareth, police chief of Banteay Meanchey province, around 200 miles northwest of the capital, Phnom Penh.
"But others asked the police to leave it where it landed and put it on shrine to pray for peace," he told Reuters on Wednesday.
The black lump of celestial rock sent villagers scurrying for cover when it thumped into the ground in the war-scarred southeast Asian nation on Monday morning.
"It made a noise like a bomb exploding," Sok Sareth said. "It's a good thing it didn't land in the village or people could have been killed."
Pictures of the meteorite were splashed across newspapers in the capital, but the item itself has been carried away by police pending scientific analysis.
Initial investigations by explosives experts still clearing the bombs and mines left behind from Cambodia's years of civil war against Pol Pot's guerrillas have not yielded many results.
"I asked my friend who works as deminer, but he has no idea what the rock is," Sok Sareth said.
Source: CNN.com
Full Version: Meteorite hits Cambodia, sparks fires
hmm... is it just me, or do you not hear of too many things hitting the earth? pretty cool disinterested. 
But.. wha? Why on earth would a firey ball of rock falling from space and setting fire to acres and acres of crops, be interpreted as a devine omen of PEACE!?
hahhahahahaha
I can just imagin it..
A 5 mile asteroid is heading towards earth. They say, Dont worry its a message from god, let it come to earth
lalala
I can just imagin it..
A 5 mile asteroid is heading towards earth. They say, Dont worry its a message from god, let it come to earth
lalala
QUOTE(BurnSide @ Jan 26 2005, 10:57 PM)
But.. wha? Why on earth would a firey ball of rock falling from space and setting fire to acres and acres of crops, be interpreted as a devine omen of PEACE!?
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Because it landed in a former Khmer Rouge zone. Do you know about Pol Pot?
The area full of mines right?
So they see a meteor hot this old war ground mine field, well, i still have no clue how that is seen as a peace omen.
So they see a meteor hot this old war ground mine field, well, i still have no clue how that is seen as a peace omen.
If anyone is interested:
Source
QUOTE
(kemĕr´ roozh) , name given to native Cambodian Communists. Khmer Rouge soldiers, aided by North Vietnamese and Viet Cong troops, began a large-scale insurgency against government forces in 1970, quickly gaining control over more than two thirds of the country. The strength of the Khmer Rouge rose dramatically from around 3,000 in 1970 to more than 30,000 in 1973, enabling most of the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong troops to withdraw. In 1975 the movement, led by Pol Pot , overthrew the Cambodian government, establishing “Democratic Kampuchea.” The new government carried out a radical program of evacuating cities, closing schools and factories, and herding the population into collective farms. Intellectuals and skilled workers were assassinated, and a total of perhaps as many as 1.5 million died, inclusive of starvation and forced marches. In 1979, after increasing tensions with Vietnam, Vietnamese troops invaded, aiding a rival Communist faction to depose the Khmer Rouge government. The Khmer Rouge, however, continued to field an army of c.30,000 near the Thai border and retained UN recognition as the official Cambodian government. In 1982 it formed a coalition with former premier Norodom Sihanouk and non-Communist leader Son Sann. Khieu Samphan officially succeeded Pol Pot as head of the Khmer Rouge in 1985, but Pol Pot was believed to remain the real leader. All Cambodian factions signed (1991) a treaty calling for UN-supervised elections and disarming 70% of all forces. In 1992 the United Nations assumed the government's administrative functions, while the Khmer Rouge withdrew from the peace process and resumed fighting. The following year the Khmer Rouge rejected the results of the UN-run elections that brought a coalition government to Cambodia. The guerrilla force lost about half to three quarters of its strength (3,000-4,000 soldiers) in a mass defection in 1996. Factional fighting within the Khmer Rouge in 1997 led to Pol Pot's ouster, trial, and imprisonment by the Khmer Rouge. The group continued to disintegrate, and factional fighting resumed in 1998. Pol Pot died in April, Khieu Samphan surrendered in Dec., 1998, and by 1999 most members had defected, surrendered, or been captured.
Source
Hundreds of thousands of Cambodians were murdered under the Khmer Rouge.
That still doesn't make a firey ball of death a good sign for peace in my books.
But nobody died! I completely understand why they would consider it a sign of peace.
Been hearing alot of stories abt meteors hitting the earth lately, especially in the past year or so. Usually one just hears about things burning up in the atmosphere. I guess these little guys are getting bigger. They experts say that alot of little guys come preceding a big guy. That makes sense, but who's to say that means a big guy will come along and hit us? What if one just passes by? After all, we move in an orbit and perhaps we've moved out of the way before a big guy comes. Perhaps with really fast media and communications nowadays, it just makes sense that the more globally faster we are at communicating, the more we will hear of random events, and that nothing really is happening more often than previously. I better stop rambling 
I don't think more are coming our way, we just have the technology to report all the ones that hit. Quite a few do.
Also, our constant pollution is a major drain on the layers that protect the earth from things like meteorites.
Also, our constant pollution is a major drain on the layers that protect the earth from things like meteorites.
we are lucky we got this big thing hanging around in our solar syste
you see them scars... Each 1 of them was more powerful than say every nuclear weapon exploding all at once on earth a few times over..
Space rocks, comets, asteroids, meteors are not a sign of peace.
We DO NOT want big ones to smash into earth.
you see them scars... Each 1 of them was more powerful than say every nuclear weapon exploding all at once on earth a few times over..
Space rocks, comets, asteroids, meteors are not a sign of peace.
We DO NOT want big ones to smash into earth.
Hmm another one in asia....
QUOTE(BurnSide @ Jan 26 2005, 02:57 PM)
But.. wha? Why on earth would a firey ball of rock falling from space and setting fire to acres and acres of crops, be interpreted as a devine omen of PEACE!?
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You should see how happy they are when someone gets kicked in the crotch...it's like winning the lottery there...
I'm kidding...
Well I guess with as much money as meteorites go for, I guess it could be a good omen...
That made me laugh out loud at work. 
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