“IT’S a miracle that nobody got killed,” says Karien Geere of Lakeside.

This after a massive boulder weighing several tons hurtled down the mountain, over Boyes Drive, crashed through the boundary fence, hitting two trees, before smashing into their house.

This was at 21:00 on 23 January, but the family was too shocked at the time to phone the newspaper.

The family were all home when they heard a thundering sound, which they first thought was a truck on the road. “Then I heard my neighbour screaming. We rushed outside to try and see what was going on.”

The sound grew louder and louder. “When the boulder hit the house, we expected to see the wheels of a truck flying overhead,” says Geere, who gets the shivers when she remembers the sound.

The boulder’s trajectory was slowed by two blue gum trees in the garden, which it flattened. It hit the wall of one of the children’s bedrooms.

“Sometimes we swim at night; we had gone to Spur that evening and so we were not bopping about in the pool.”

In shock, the family decided to go up the road to check if anyone had been injured. “There we found a man wondering around looking dazed and confused. The rock narrowly missed his car as it rolled across the road.”

Black tar marks are visible streaked onto the renegade rock.

Geere says the man was driving a small silver car, but they didn’t get his details.

The family is left contemplating their lucky escape. “My father says it is because he prays for us every night,” says Geere.

“It’s made us stop being so busy chasing the wind...worrying about unimportant stuff,” she adds.

They are also wondering what to do about their unintended garden feature.

“Our garden has been redesigned by Mother Nature,” she says. “The rock may need to be dynamited into smaller pieces.” The insurance company has declared the incident an “Act of God”.

Asked if advance warning of further possible rock falls was possible, Table Mountain National Park spokesperson Merle Collins says: “We cannot forecast rockfalls (not even geotechnicians can), due to the unpredictable nature of the environment where wind, fire, rain and the natural movement of the earth play a significant role.”