At 10:30 A-M- yesterday, a red rain that was certified by a local bacteriologist to be blood fell on a small community of La Sierra, Chocó. A sample was collected and taken to the nearest town, Bagadó where it was analyzed. The priest of the hamlet says it's a sign fromGod that people will have to change their sinful ways.
Here's the article, in Spanish:
Investigan origen de lluvia con apariencia de sangre en área rural de Bagadó (Chocó)
El párroco Jhony Milton Córdoba calificó el hecho como una posible señal de Dios para que el hombre reconsidere su actuar.
El hecho insólito, que todavía la jerarquía eclesiástica no se atreve a tomar como un milagro, ocurrió ayer a las 10:30 a.m. en el corregimiento La Sierra.
De acuerdo con los testimonios que le llegaron al sacerdote recogidos por el padre Córdoba, a esa hora caía un aguacero y de un momento a otro, observaron que en un espacio de 100 metros aproximadamente el líquido tenía una coloración roja y así continuó por alrededor de 30 minutos.
Con el transcurso de las horas de nuevo el agua volvió a aclararse. Sin embargo, un habitante recogió una muestra que llevaron hasta el casco urbano de Bagadó y la bacterióloga del pueblo la sometió a un análisis con reactivos y certificó que efectivamente se trata de sangre, de acuerdo con el párroco.
No obstante, no se especificaron más detalles, pues no hay luz y fue imposible realizar más pruebas.
"Eso es difícil explicarlo, pero en el fondo puede ser una señal de Dios que está invitando a cambiar de forma de actuar, porque el hombre quiere cambiar el curso de la historia y ser él mismo dios", dijo.
La Sierra es una comunidad compuesta por cerca de 200 personas, negros en su mayoría, que en principio se asentaron a orillas del río Andágueda, a media hora de la cabecera municipal. En 1994 una avalancha obligó a reubicar el poblado y muchas de las casas fueron construidas en una colina en la cual estaba el cementerio.
Las tradiciones religiosas tienen gran arraigo y se mezclan con la cosmogonía afro.
"Se ven cosas inexplicables, por eso uno no puede aventurar a dar hipótesis. Lo que estamos haciendo es esperar a que el padre mande a Quibdo la muestra del líquido", anotó por su parte el obispo de Quibdo, monseñor Fidel León Cadavid.
Por lo pronto, una comisión eclesiástica esperaba desplazarse hasta el lugar donde ocurrió el presunto milagro a verificar las versiones.
The excitement and fear of Chocó within the hearts of those, like me, who still need to visit this place, all rolled into one. Raindrops of blood, man.
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Desideria (Moderator) (Trustee board) says on Aug 4, 2008, 15:12:
It's like from a García Márquez novel....
"When shall we three meet again? In thunder, lightning, or in rain?"(First Witch in Macbeth)
Here are a few possible explanations ----- And if you don't buy any of them then sure, God or the Devil have spoken. See clips below.
It's raining blood
* 18 March 2006
* From New Scientist Print Edition.
* Vincenzo Liguori, Manly, New South Wales, Australia
I'm surprised that neither your article nor the original paper suggest a fairly obvious explanation for the red rain that fell over Kerala in India (4 March, p 34). If indeed the link between the red rains and a meteorite can be proven, then it has been known for a while that organic compounds in meteorites can form vesicles that look like cells when they interact with water.
This phenomenon is mentioned with regard to the Murchison meteorite on NASA's website: web99.arc.nasa.gov/~astrochm/vesicle.html. It is also mentioned in an interview with a co-investigator for the Stardust mission, referring to interstellar ice: www.ibiblio.org/astrobiology/index.php?page= interview06.
Although I can't find the references, I seem to remember that vesicles obtained by similar processes can be made to "replicate" under certain circumstances.
From Martin Pitt, University of Sheffield
To a microbiologist, the particles in the red rain may look superficially like red blood cells, but to a chemical engineer they look like liposomes or microcapsules. These are bubbles of oil which can spontaneously trap aqueous material. They are typically spherical when formed, but may partially collapse with change of temperature and/or pressure. The activity that the researchers observed in cedar wood oil at 300 °C may be rearrangement of material rather than reproduction.
There are many known methods of formation, and more to be discovered, but I would suggest that a source of oil mist or smoke has condensed on particles of ice and dust, which could even be meteoric in origin. One possible source would be a ship burning red oil in the Arabian Sea. The reported sonic boom could have been the rupture of an aircraft oil tank, a military cargo plane with 50 tonnes of hydraulic oil, perhaps, though the length of time the red rain continued suggests a longer release. The absorption spectrum is not that of haemoglobin, but is feasible for an iron complex precipitating at a surface.
Sheffield, South Yorkshire, UK
From Kevin Gardner
Rhodophyceae "red" algae are a likely cause of Hazel Muir's red rain. The description and the low resolution of the cell photo points in particular to a Porphyridium species, such as is commonly seen in bird baths where soluble salts collect.
It can form mucilaginous masses resembling drops of blood or even tomato sauce at times of population explosions. It is an alga that is open to desiccation, which is when its distribution and survival mechanism kicks in.
West Huntspill, Somerset, UK
From Rachel Cave, National University of Ireland
If the material creating the red rain in Kerala turns out to be mammalian blood, there is no need to invoke exploding bats to find a source for it. It was commonplace in my childhood in Ireland for slaughterhouses to dump their effluent into nearby watercourses and I wonder if the same practice goes on in India today. All that is then needed to provide downpours of blood in rainfall over succeeding days is a tornado of the kind that empties water bodies of their fish or frogs along with the water.
I do hope it turns out to be alien life forms after all, though.
Galway, Republic of Ireland
From Ian Simmons
Godfrey Louis's paper on the Kerala red rain will not be the first time the organic nature of such falls has been considered in the scientific press. Charles Fort, in his Book of the Damned (1919), summarises quite a variety of red rains, mostly culled from the scientific press. In the on-line version (www.resologist.net/damnei.htm) Fort scholar "Mr X" (his real name) gives the references for all the cases Fort refers to, many of them from reputable journals including Nature.
A number of the reports Fort cites involve the fall persisting over one area for several days, being preceded by loud "thunderclaps" and on occasions being accompanied by falls of "slag" that may be of meteoric origin.
Also, in the early days of London's Royal Society, its collection included a sample of a "rain of blood" collected in the Isle of Wight by Sir John Oglander. It is unfortunately now lost.
Penarth, Vale of Glamorgan, UK
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(CBS) Outside Sacramento, at the small Vietnamese Catholic Martyrs church, a statue of the Virgin Mary appears to be crying, reports The Early Show national correspondent Hattie Kauffman.
"Just the fact that it's coming from the eyes, and it's a red color like blood, I would say that there's a miracle either way," said Dave Leatherby, who visited the statue. "Even if there's a natural explanation, it's a sign."
It is a sign that could mean something different to everyone who has traveled here to see it.
"With Christmas coming up, they say Jesus is the reason as opposed to the commercialization," Lana Cosentino said. "So maybe this is happening for a reason. I just think she's crying for all the sins of the world and everything."
Parishioners first noticed the tears almost two weeks ago. A priest was cleaning the statue and wiped away the stains only to see them reappear.
"We came here Thanksgiving night," Vivian Valles said. "The blood was on her chest. We came back the next day and it had run all the way down her dress."
Marlene Larkin traveled from Las Vegas, believing the Virgin Mary will help her battle breast cancer.
"I pray to Mary a lot," she said. "I felt like I need to be here to see this."
But father James Murphy of the Sacramento diocese shies away from calling this a miracle.
"These kinds of phenomena are fairly common," he said. "But the number that turn out to be miraculous are very, very rare."
However, it does bring more people to the church.
"I think we need to respect people's experience through the eyes of faith," he said. "And God does use these things to bring us closer to him."
Leatherby says: "I think many people have forgotten about God, and I think she's weeping about God's children who are lost and are searching, and looking for answers."
Church officials say they will investigate if the phenomenon continues. But for believers, or those seeking guidance, healing or inspiration, there is no need for proof.
Desi this is actually from a John Gardner novel, I believe it was "The Sunlight Dialogues" but may have been a different one. Bones fell from the sky as well. ¨Course it comes as quite a surprise that the old Chocoano was reading Gardner novels.
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ColombianoGringo (Moderator) (Trustee board) says on Aug 4, 2008, 17:44:
So it miraculously turned back to water, but one guy managed to save a sample.
I'm going to have to go with
on this one.
0 funny, 0 helpful.
ColombianoGringo (Moderator) (Trustee board) says on Aug 4, 2008, 17:49:
Oh wait. I'm so sorry. I missed the part about how the town was built on top of the cemetery.
The sapos are great C.G. Where did u come up with that one? This is why I really appreciate this website so much. Didnt take long for PBH to cut to the chase did it?
Thanks for the post Desidearest it was really informative and truly meets the original goals of PBH.
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