The Wilcock family
The Gloucestershire family who found black fragments of the Winchcombe meteorite on their driveway the morning after it fell in 2021.
Key facts
- Nationality
- British
- Field
- Finders of the Winchcombe meteorite
On the evening of 28 February 2021, at about ten to ten, a brilliant fireball lit up the sky over south-west England for around six seconds. It was recorded by doorbell cameras and by the meteor cameras of the UK Fireball Alliance, a network of amateur and professional observers. From the recordings, scientists worked out that any surviving pieces had probably fallen around the small town of Winchcombe in Gloucestershire.
Rob and Cathryn Wilcock lived in Winchcombe. Rob had heard a rattling noise outside that night. The next morning the family found a pile of dark, crumbly stones and black powder on their driveway, scattered as if something had smashed on landing. After hearing about the fireball, they contacted the scientists. Their own doorbell camera had recorded the fireball.
The pieces, about 300 grams in total, were collected by scientists from the Natural History Museum. They turned out to be a CM carbonaceous chondrite, a rare and fragile kind of meteorite rich in water-bearing clay minerals and carbon compounds. It was the first carbonaceous chondrite fall ever recovered in Britain, and the first British fall found in 30 years.
Because it was picked up within about twelve hours, the Winchcombe meteorite was barely changed by Earth's air and water. More pieces were found in a nearby field by a search team, and the meteorite has been studied by scientists across the world.
On the timeline
- 28 February 2021Winchcombe: a meteorite on a driveway