New Zealand police: Mystery flying object turns out to be part from a log splitter

Wed, May 21 04:47 AM

WELLINGTON, New Zealand (AP) _ A small mysterious metal object that crashed through the roof of a house and slammed into the floor in a northern New Zealand town last month flew off a log splitter, police said Wednesday. Police initially speculated that it fell from a small plane passing over the rural town of Whakatu on the country's North Island on April 16, but aviation officials later said it may have been shot from spinning farm machinery.

No one was injured, and authorities did not identify the resident whose home was struck. The small Whakatu settlement is surrounded by farmland.

Aviation authorities tracked down a pilot whose aircraft they thought might be responsible and found nothing missing from the plane when checked at a nearby airport, Civil Aviation Authority spokesman Bill Sommer said at the time. "Far be it for us to speculate .

but it may have come off some agricultural equipment that was spinning at pretty high speed and a piece shot off it," Sommer told The Associated Press. The object was about 11 centimeters (4.4 inches) long, 4.5 centimeters (1.8 inches) wide, weighed about one kilogram (2.2 pounds), looked like cast iron and had a shiny, curved surface on top, he said.

Now Sergeant Bob Gordon said inquiries had shown the part broke off a log splitter being used near the damaged house. "One of my constables ascertained .

it was a log splitter .

that disintegrated," he said.

"An unexplained flying object now it's explained." "It didn't come off a plane," he added.

Inside News

Editor's picks