[meteorite-list] New Iron Meteorite Found In Colorado (Cotopaxi Meteorite)

From: Ron Baalke <baalke_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Thu Apr 22 10:07:00 2004
Message-ID: <200210111603.JAA27077_at_zagami.jpl.nasa.gov>

http://www.denverpost.com/Stories/0,1413,36%7E53%7E916761,00.html

Falling star has its debut
Museum to feature rare iron meteorite

By Erin Emery
Denver Post
October 11, 2002

COLORADO SPRINGS - Richard and Sharon Walker plunked down $700 for a new
metal detector, watched the instructional video, put in new batteries and
started looking for gold.

Only 45 minutes into their maiden search along a dry streambed on private
property near Cotopaxi, the machine went bonkers.

Sharon started digging. She unearthed a rusty, jagged rock about the size of
a child's fist. It seemed heavy for its size.

"This is weird," Richard Walker said he thought. "This is a weird,
funny-looking rock."

The Walkers, both investigators for the Department of Defense in Colorado
Springs, said they didn't realize they had just uncovered a museum piece - a
rare, iron meteorite.

The 8.5-ounce rock is a mere 4.5 billion years old and the first iron
meteorite found in Colorado in 30 years.

There have only been 75 known meteorites discovered in Colorado, and only 14
of those are iron.

Richard and Sharon said they took their October 2000 find to a rock shop in
Colorado Springs. A rock expert tentatively identified it as a meteorite but
said the Walkers should get more proof.

The Walkers took it home and put it "on a shelf in with the dirty clothes,"
Richard said. It sat for nearly two years.

Then, the Walkers saw that Jack Murphy, curator of geology at the Denver
Museum of Nature & Science, would be in Saguache over Memorial Day weekend
this year to teach people how to identify meteorites. A fireball had fallen
in that area Aug. 17, 2001.

"We introduced ourselves and showed him our meteorite. All the staff said,
'Wow' and when they said, 'Wow,' we said, 'Wow."'

Murphy said he wanted John Wasson, a meteorite expert at the University of
California at Los Angeles, to look at it. Two months ago, "We got an e-mail
from Dr. Wasson, and it said, 'Wow. I'm excited.' By that time, we'd almost
had a heart attack," Richard said.

The Walkers gave permission for Wasson to slice off two pieces, one for UCLA
and the other for the Denver museum, which will feature it in its permanent
meteorite collection. The museum held a news conference Thursday.

The meteorite will be on display during Astronomy Day on Saturday.

Most meteorites are from the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. Iron
meteorites are rarely found because they hit the Earth with enough force to
bury themselves in the dirt.

"The primary question to be learned is where they come from," Murphy said.

What's particularly unique about the Cotopaxi meteorite - named because it
was found near the south-central Colorado town along the Arkansas River - is
that it contains varying amounts of nickel, gallium, arsenic and iridium.
Those elements make it unusual compared to other iron meteorites.

"The new find is significant to science because it represents a new grouping
within one of the main classifications of iron meteorites," Wasson said.

The Cotopaxi meteorite will be registered in the World Meteorite Registry
Book at the London Museum, and it will be on loan to the Denver museum until
January.

The Walkers' meteorite isn't related toFuneral ireballs seen streaking
across the skies this week from Utah to Kansas to New Mexico.

The Walkers' rock probably crashed to Earth about 100 years ago.

The Walkers have turned down $6,000 for the rock. They haven't decided what
to do with it - keep it, sell it, donate it to a museum.

Richard Walker said he has tried to find another one with his metal
detector, but so far he's found only a collection of barbed wire, bullets,
nails and beer cans.

"You know, if I never find another one in my life, we hit the jackpot on
this," Walker said. "Let's just say the odds of us finding it, and the way
we did, were astronomic."
Received on Fri 11 Oct 2002 12:03:15 PM PDT