No sign of mysterious Patensie ‘meteorite’

Port Elizabeth – A team from the Kouga municipality in the Eastern Cape has had no luck in locating a mysterious object from the sky, believed to be a meteorite that struck near the Patensie area on Sunday night.

“We have given up on the search for now. We were quite a large team and we couldn’t find anything,” municipal spokesperson Mfundo Sobele told News24 on Monday afternoon.

“We asked local residents who told us about seeing something in the sky, but its exact location could not be determined.”

He could not immediately confirm if the emergency services team would return to the area on Tuesday.

“The team will now meet and decide on the way forward.”

Several witnesses described seeing flashes across the sky, as well as a loud explosion.

Francois Greyling, a Democratic Alliance councillor in the Despatch area, who lives fairly close to Patensie, also heard an explosion.

“I studied in Potchefstroom where the army did bombing practice which had a distinct thumping sound. I was watching a movie with the kids and the wife, when I heard what sounded like a bomb going off,” he told News24 earlier.

“It immediately reminded me of that thumping sound.”

Greyling said he “thought nothing of it” until he saw people talking on social media about a possible meteorite strike in the area.

A News24 user said on Sunday night: “Massive explosion… a series of ‘several lightning flashes’ were observed in Paradise Beach [Jeffreys Bay] in a westerly direction at 21:00 on 8th Nov followed by about approximately 3 minutes later the sound of a massive explosion as though a bomb had gone off.”

Ahmed Areff, News24