A shoe was thrown at Hillary Clinton as she delivered a keynote speech at a conference hosted by Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries in Las Vegas. 

Fortunately, she was not struck.

"What was that, a bat? Was that a bat?" Clinton said moments after ducking from the flying object that went past her.

She then tried to playoff the incident with humor.

"[Was] that somebody throwing something at me? Is that part of Cirque du Soleil?" The former First Lady and Secretary of State joked. "My goodness, I didn't know that solid waste management was so controversial. ... Thank goodness she didn't play softball like I did."

The woman who threw the black and orange shoe was being questioned and would face federal charges, according to U.S. Secret Service supervisory special agent in Las Vegas, Brian Spellacy. It wasn't immediately clear what the charges would be.

After her speech, Clinton answered questions posed by Jerry Simms, the outgoing chairman of the organization. Simms first offered his "deepest apology for that crude interruption."

Clinton answered questions broadly, saying she felt politics today leads people to "do what they think will be rewarded," the Associated Press reported. 

Clinton is ranked by Forbes as one of the top 50 most powerful women in the world. In 2008, she ran for the Democratic presidential nomination against Barack Obama. She is also widely expected to run for the White House again in the 2016 election.

In a similar event, former President George W. Bush dodged two shoes thrown by an Iraqi journalist during a press conference in Baghdad in December 2008.