Hi Steve,
I had heard that the neighborhoods of the Park Forest fall were rough, but I have trouble believing that someone who thought they were getting shot at, crawled into their house under fire, then put it behind them and went to bed. No 911 call, no return fire, no nothing.
My guess is that this guy really believed that: 1) anyone shooting at him was either not really after him personally, 2) he had bulletproof walls and windows in his house, 3) society in that area has devolved to such a state that random shootings are as common to them as telemarketers are to us, or 4) his story might have been stretched a bit.
Further, why would any red-blooded American park his car on the street in such a rough area when there is a perfectly good, unused driveway just sitting there outside the house?
Just my thoughts.
Dr. Watson
aka: Martin
Hello Dr. Martin "Watson" and list,
When Matt told me this, I really did believe him as being serious and truthful. I think it was late, and his initial reaction was pure instinct. I didn't get the impression that he felt someone was personally going after him, but that something was whizzing near him and he automatically took cover. I think it was his assessment of the situation after the fact, a few minutes later, especially that he didn't hear or see anyone or anything else really happening in the area that made him dismiss the fear.
I suppose, if he hadn't found the specimen the next day, he probably would have never told anyone the story, as it would have been a bit embarrassing. Finding the meteorite probably helped him realize that he wasn't really crazy.
The neighborhood actually is not that bad (but he does work over in South Chicago Heights where I have heard it is very bad), and I think the reason he said he pulled back into the street after pulling in the drive way was to not block his wife's car in the driveway. Plus, living at the end of the street, he has to turn around to go the other way when he leaves anyway, and it is much easier to do that by pulling in and backing out than trying to park in the direction of pulling in only afterwards to try to back into his driveway to turn around to go the other way.
I don't mean to drag this out, but I didn't mean to make the story so long in the first place and I am sure I am boring many of you now. The guy seemed very sincere and the story made sense to my wife and I when we heard it. Obviously being there seeing and hearing more than what I had bandwidth to pass on in my last email I had to try to cut it down.
But I am game to discuss as many of the details if necessary.
Besides, the main point of the whole post was to get to the fact that there was a several minute delay in Matt seeing the fireball and then it impacting near him later. The fact of the long delay between the meteoroids extinguishing and then reaching the ground, has seemed to have been missed by all of us "experts" so if indeed there is a 4 to 8 minute delay, then that would seem to confirm his story, as strange as it may have seemed. Out of all the people I have talked with here (into the hundreds now) many saw the flash, quite a few heard the sonic booms, but few actually experienced the impacting first hand. Matt was the first person that I know of who both saw the fireball and witnessed (more or less) the impact.
Steve Arnold
