[meteorite-list] Antarctic Meteorite Treaty?

From: Frank Prochaska <fprochas_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Thu Apr 22 10:00:07 2004
Message-ID: <NDBBICFKNKHAAEEJLDALAEDPDBAA.fprochas_at_premier1.net>

Hello!

I did some research and inquiries on this list on this topic about a year
ago. I had quite a bit of correspondence with people publicly on the list,
privately with list members, as well as with folks with NASA. The question
as you phrased it seems simple enough, but I have yet to find a simple
answer.

The antarctic treaty originally grew out of discussions associated with the
international geophysical year in the late 50s, and it seems that formal
treaties were signed by the mid-60s. However, "the treaty" is not a single
static document that nations signed in the 60s. Periodically,
representatives get back together at international conferences and make
modifications. If you look up the treaty itself, it really does not seem to
say much that impacts meteorites and private collection or ownership. It is
these other agreements or modifications that are made under the authority of
the treaty and so become part of it, that are important to your question.
These modifications have proven difficult for me to trace back, and it seems
that sale or trade of meteorites collected from antarctica was acceptable
for a period of time beyond the signing of the original treaty, through at
least 1976. (In or slighly after 1976, NASA traded a number of new samples
to private collections, but this was prior to the formal arrangement with
the Smithsonian to curate NASA's antarctic material.) I should say as well
that the treaty and agreements do not specifically prohibit sale or private
ownership of material from antarctica. The agreements do provide that
geologic and biologic material may only be removed from the continent for
research and educational purposes, and from a practical standpoint, this is
the provision used (by the governments of the signatories to the treaty) to
exclude private ownership and retain all material in government collections.
I should also point out that at this point it seems that almost every
country on the planet has signed this treaty.

I corresponded with several different folks who put me in touch with various
people in the United States involved in the legal aspects of this treaty. I
sent them questions regarding the treaty implications to our hobby, however,
none of these contacts chose to reply.

The other thing that I did was try to establish which antarctic meteorites
were in fact in private collections. I have compiled the following list
from two general sources: the Catalog of Meteorites, and members of this
list who were kind enough to send me names of meteorites they either had in
their own collections or knew of in other private collections.

I went through the entries for each antarctic meteorite in the Catalog, and
noted which had samples recorded in private collections and a total of how
much, if listed. This list is:

Adelie Land, L5, 1 g
ALH 76001, L6, 89.9 g
ALH 76003, L6, 13.2 g
ALH 76005, Euc, 9.5 g
ALH 76006, H6, 19.2 g
ALH 76008, H6, 6.4 g
ALH 76009, L6, 513.2 g
Mount Baldr, H6, 55.5 g
Theil Mountains, Pal, 43 g

IMPORTANT NOTE about this list: I was interested in total amount in private
collections because I thought that if I knew for sure that only a certain
amount of a particular meteorite was available, and someone was offering
more than that amount, I would know something was wrong. However, the
information in the catalog is not complete enough to establish this. For
example, I have 33 grams of Theil Mtns in my collection, and other have a
lot more than 10 grams. I also have 44 grams of ALH 76009, but I doubt I
hold 8 - 9% of the total amount of this meteorite in private hands. The
total weights in private hands may be closer to representative for the less
common meteorites like ALH 76005, but certainly not close for ones like
Thiel Mtns and 76009 (I believe that two dealers were involved in new trades
in the early 90's that made this additional material available).

In addition to the above, list members gave the following examples from
their own or other private collections:

Derrick Peak
Lazarev
Neptune Mountains.

For these, I would not hazard a guess as to how much is actually available
for each of these, but it is not a large amount.

List members have also related to me that institutions are very reluctant to
trade even those meteorites that appear to be "pre-treaty" finds and already
somewhat available in the market. It took some very long negotiations and
the trade of some exquisite material to secure the Lazarev samples that are
currently available, for example.

If any list member has corrections or additions to this list, please send
them to me. I would greatly appreciate it!

I hope this helps!

Frank Prochaska




-----Original Message-----
From: meteorite-list-admin_at_meteoritecentral.com
[mailto:meteorite-list-admin_at_meteoritecentral.com]On Behalf Of Jeff
Kuyken
Sent: Wednesday, July 17, 2002 8:10 AM
To: Meteorite List
Subject: [meteorite-list] Antarctic Meteorite Treaty?


G'day List,

Could someone please let me know in which year the Antarctic Treaty started?
And therefore what the last year was which you can leagally purchase
specimens from. Much appreciated.

Thanks,

Jeff Kuyken
I.M.C.A. #3085
www.meteoritesaustralia.com


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Received on Wed 17 Jul 2002 02:38:47 PM PDT