Alien illness strikes Peru
 

http://www.breitbart.com/article.php...show_article=1

Andromeda Strain anyone?

I somehow doubt a hemophagic bacteria could have survived the cold of space and the heat of re-entry.

It's more likely that it's just some poisonous element/elements in the stone that were vaporized by a combination of the heat and the impact being inhaled by the inhabitants.

Though if it is the bacteria thing, they'd best be careful. No telling what kind of resistances to antibiotics it may have or how deadly and communicable it may be.

My instinct is either radiation poisoning or the meteor blew something poisonous into the air like Krylo said (OMFG, I'm agreeing with KRYLO...)

If it IS a lifeform, it wouldn't be carbon-based. Any carbon-based lifeform would combust upon re-entry into the atmosphere.

It is conceivable that the bacteria lay dormant in the center until its fragmentation on impact released it. There are bacteria living in volcanoes and places of temperatures so high that water should be instantly vaporized. In fact it is basically impossible to take a core sample of some bedrock and not come out with some form of life. Even going down miles and miles into the Earth we still find bacteria happily munching on rock. Its rather cool to think that life isn't nearly as fragile as humans say it is.

Oh yeah, I totally agree that some bacteria may have survived, it's just that the bacteria capable of surviving situations like that usually aren't hemophages, and thus don't generally cause disease.

I'd say they're never hemophages, but I'm sure I'd end up being wrong with some obscure bacteria being around that can survive that stuff and lives in people as well.

And there are theories about bacteria being able to be created and survive on the ice/rock interfaces in comets. They still hugely speculative but the work so far has looked pretty good.

But I doubt this is some kind of airborne virus. Probably just lots of dust fragments choking everyone.

well...it could be an alien bacteria, then again it could not be one.

The bacteria would have to have been growing inside the core of the said object and have not been affected by (1) the deep cold of space, (2) the high-temperature friction upon atmospheric entry, and (3) the sudden temperature change of the previous.

For however, for an alien bacteria to be exposed to our atmosphere and not be eaten alive by domestic bacteria is unlikely. Perhaps when exposed to other bacterias in the area, it was ingested, mutated, and THUS adapted to latter become a new 'unknown' illness.
This vis-a-vis to the facts of possible radiation poisoning from the said object exposed to who-knows-what kind of cosmic radiation. Humans never exposed to such radiation would then become ill.

That's my assessment anyway....

oops... sorry.. thought this was on Off-topic ^^'

But clearly it's just a bad combination of Chemical elements... Between Asbestos, Sulfur, Magnesium and so on... who knows what may be in that stuff... people could easily get sick if they suddenly get surrounded by a huge mass of the stuff

Why does it have to be alien in origin?

There are numerous bacteria and viruses in the Earth's soil, that upon an object striking it could have thrown them up into the air. Add on the heat from the meteorite, and the "smell" was most likely from whatever the plantlife/bacterial Earthen source was that was toasted...you know..yup.
whatnot.

totally.

-- http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20070918...e_070918231236