The standard homeowners policy is named perils for personal property. One of those named perils is falling objects, with the caveat that coverage only applies to property in a building if the roof or outside wall is first damaged by a falling object, and damage to the falling object itself is not covered.
So what falling objects might come through the roof or outside wall before damaging property? Trees are the most likely items to come through a roof, although if the insured gets carried away with heavy Christmas decorations Santa and the reindeer could theoretically come crashing down.
However things do fall from space, such as the rogue meteorite that crashed through a woman's home in British Columbia recently. She was sleeping and woke up to her dog barking then a huge explosion as debris covered her face. She moved a pillow only to find a large meteorite had come crashing through the roof, nearly missing her head.
This is not the first time a meteorite has come through someone's roof; it happens occasionally, although there is no database or tracking of such events. In 1954 a meteorite came through a roof in Alabama and actually struck the insured who was laying on the sofa. Fortunately, she was not seriously injured, but such events do happen.
The meteorite is the perfect example of this peril; a falling object, coming through the roof, and damaging property inside. While in this instance the rock landed on the woman's pillow so none of her personal property was damaged. Had it landed elsewhere it certainly could have damaged property. While this rock is estimated to weigh 2.8 pounds, remember the speed at which it is traveling; anything traveling from space is traveling incredibly fast, from 25,000 miles per hour to 160,000 miles per hour. That's how it was able to crash through the roof and ceiling and into the bedroom. It could readily damage any property found within a dwelling.
Earlier this year we wrote about the airplane that experienced engine failure and scattered parts over a number of neighborhoods (See When Things Fall From the Sky). Like the meteorite, airplane parts qualify as falling objects if they crash through the roof.
While at first glance the peril of falling objects that comes through the roof or exterior walls before doing damage sounds a little odd, there are plenty of things other than tree limbs that can do just that; fall from the sky, crash through the roof and damage personal property.