150th anniversary of rare meteorite smashing into Shropshire countryside set to be marked today

A spectacular celestial event happened in the skies above Shropshire exactly 150 years ago when a rare meteorite smashed into the countryside.

At exactly 3.40pm on April 20, 1876, the 3.5 kg Rowton Meteorite fell from the skies crashing into the ground in a field to be found by George Brooks.

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Today on the exact time of the 150th anniversary later the Lord Lieutenant of Shropshire, Anna Turner, will join group of meteorite enthusiasts, geologists, villagers, and councillors at the site to unveil an interpretation panel.

The iron meteorite, known as the Rowton siderite, was only the second known to have fallen in Great Britain.

Accounts from the day record that it fell on land belonging to the Duke of Cleveland.

The noise when it fell sounded like “something falling during a heavy shower of rain accompanied by a hissing and then a rumbling noise”.

An entry in Nature from the same year described reports of “a strange rumbling noise in the atmosphere, followed almost instantaneously by a startling explosion resembling a discharge of heavy artillery.

“There was neither lightning nor thunder, but rain was falling heavily, the sky being obscured with dark clouds for some time both before and after the incident narrated.”

About an hour after the explosion, Mr George Brooks, found a hole cut in the ground and he investigated it with a stick.

The dramatic arrival of the Rowton siderite was reported by a contemporary Wolverhampton Chronicle, which said that about 3.40pm on that day in 1876 “a strange rumbling noise was heard in the atmosphere, followed almost instantaneously by a startling explosion resembling a discharge of heavy artillery.”