Category: Notes

Throughout history there have been cases of strange things raining from the sky, as if some unseen celestial prankster is making merry at our expense.

In Gorsky, Russia, 1940, thousands of silver coins tumble to the earth, much to the delight of the local peasants.

In Kendarington, England, 1989, a couple in a churchyard witness a shower of coins. The coins themselves are dated between 1902 and 1953, ‘old money’ in the UK, and therefore of no real value to anyone.

In Columbus, Ohio, the United States, 1991, thousands of dollar bills descend to the streets. Upstanding citizens hand over $500 to the authorities. One can only presume that the rest of the money is ‘absorbed’ into the local economy.

But it is not always currency that assails us from above.

In Queensland, Australia, 1989, thousands of dead sardines fall from the heavens ‘like a sheet of silver rain’ about the house of Mr and Mrs Degen. The Degen’s fill a bowlful of the fish for their cat, Winksy, and keep a couple for themselves as souvenirs. The police report from that day details that the fall of fish is confined to an area of two acres around the Degen property, and no more. The remaining sardines are quickly snaffled up by the local wildlife, no doubt to Winksy’s dismay.

In Stroud, England, 1987, a two day bout of torrential rain brings with it thousands of tiny striped frogs that bounce off umbrellas and land on pavements, hopping away to nearby lakes and streams. The frogs are of the species Allobates olfersiodes or the Rio Rocket, native to the forests of Eastern Brazil. Two days later, a similar downpour in Cheltenham brings more of these amphibious travellers.

As previously stated, these events are not a modern phenomenon. Indeed, deep within the pages of The History of the Northern Peoples, by the Swedish writer Olaus Magnus, is a woodcut depicting a fall of fish over his homeland. The book in question was published in 1555.

Modern science attempts to explain these showers as the product of waterspouts or tornadoes, whereby objects or creatures are collected up by powerful winds and then deposited elsewhere. Whilst I concede that this is a possibility, it fails to explain why only a certain species of frog fell in Stroud, or only silver pennies in Gorsky. Science will counter this by stating that, during a tornado, the circular winds will separate whatever it picks up according to specific gravity, rather like a centrifuge. But if this is the case, what happens to the rest of the detritus that said tornado must have also gathered up? Surely we should see further showers of a singular species or denomination further along the storm’s path?

As this appears not to be the case, what are the origins of these flurries of animals and objects? Even I find it difficult to believe that matter, living or otherwise, can be spontaneously created. So it stands to reason that these mysterious sky-borne tourists must have started life somewhere.

On the 4^th of March 2002, I received a call from a distressed individual in Hereford, requesting my assistance with one such occurrence. I duly travelled west and was greeted by a local farmer, who regaled me with a tale of several hundred large fish following from the sky the previous night. The fish had landed only on his house and a neighbouring field, and they were very much alive when this occurred. The majority of them had suffocated out of water, but the farmer had managed to save a couple, placing them in a large water butt.

I was a little surprised upon viewing the survivors: they were a pair of mature Koi carp.

I took the fish with the farmer’s blessing and gifted them to a local aquarium, where, to the best of my knowledge, they still reside.

I was at a loss to explain this and, I must concede, it was not long before other, more pressing cases began to occupy my time.

A few months later, a colleague of mine based in Japan sent me a translation of a local newspaper cutting. The article details a Koi farm in the Aichi Prefecture that managed to misplace its entire stock of fish overnight. There were no signs of a break-in, and one suspects the stealing of two hundred-odd examples of valuable carp from a locked building would not only attract some attention, but also be terribly time consuming.

The date this piscatorial heist took place? The 3^rd of March, 2002.

Whilst it is definitely possible to draw a correlation between these two events, if some type of a transference did take place, the actual mechanics are, at best, an enigma.

Perhaps it is the work of some unseen celestial prankster after all.

Dr Thomas Gotobed