[meteorite-list] meteorites on the Moon

From: Alan Rubin <aerubin_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Thu Apr 22 09:52:23 2004
Message-ID: <003301c24def$535e32c0$bc246180_at_igpp.ucla.edu>

Two meteorites found on the Moon have been named: Bench Crater and
Hadley Rille. There are an additional two probable iron meteorite
fragments, a 2-mm fragment recovered from the fines fraction of
Apollo 11 regiolith sample 10085-18, and a 0.3x0.4-mm iron
fragment from Apollo 16 regolith core sample 60014. Both Bench
Crater and Hadley Rille were extensively heated when they impacted
the lunar surface. This is reasonable because the peak in the
relative velocity distribution of projectiles hitting the moon is
14 km/sec. Less than 2% of the prjectiles survive as unmelted
fragments.
    As far as nomenclature is concerned, most scientists refer to
lunar material blasted off the Moon and delivered to Earth as
lunar meteorites. Meteorites found on the moon don't seem to have
a special label and are simply referred to as meteorites from the
Moon.
Alan Rubin
Received on Tue 27 Aug 2002 01:29:40 PM PDT