A giant ice cube or a gift from God?

Weather experts cannot explain what caused a microwave oven-sized block of ice to fall from the sky and shatter on the pavement outside an upmarket Douglasdale complex at 9.58am on Friday.

But the security guards who witnessed the icy object plummet to its pulpy end believe that it might have been a blessing from above.

"It came from God... because the (security guard) strike is over," one of the men told the Saturday Star.

'There is no poo here'

One of his colleagues, 26-year-old Soweto resident Sizwe Sofika, vehemently rejected suggestions that the ice block could have been frozen human waste ejected from a passing aircraft.

"There is no poo here," Sofika said. "There is no smell."

Sofika said he and fellow Special Armed Services guard, S'Wester Moya, were sitting in a security booth outside the Fontana de la Vita complex when they saw a white object fall from the sky and hit the pavement with a resounding crash.

"We thought it was something like plastic. When it hit the pavement it cracked into pieces and it made a noise like a collision," Sofika said.

Although he had seen snow in Newcastle, KwaZulu Natal, when he was an eight-year-old boy, Sofika said he had never seen anything like the large ice ball before.

The impact of the object's fall created a small crater on the pavement, which was also covered with pieces of broken ice. Asked what he believed had caused the falling ice ball, television weather forecaster Simon Gear said he could offer no explanation.

"I haven't a clue... there are various stories about airplanes but I understand that those are urban legends."

Weather SA forecaster Lee-Anne Clark was equally nonplussed.

"We have no comment on that... except to say that whatever caused this wasn't natural," she said.

• This article was originally published on page 1 of Saturday Star on July 01, 2006