[meteorite-list] New California meteorite

From: Matson, Robert <ROBERT.D.MATSON_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Thu Apr 22 10:18:25 2004
Message-ID: <AF564D2B9D91D411B9FE00508BF1C86901B4E6FA_at_US-Torrance.mail.saic.com>

Hi All,

As I reported earlier, seeing Columbia reenter this past Saturday
was not my primary reason for being in the Mojave Desert -- I was
actually heading up there to do some meteorite field recovery work
for the day. I did find one new meteorite of just over 100 grams,
and have scanned in some images of it at the time it was found:

http://members.cox.net/mojave_meteorites/feb1a.jpg
http://members.cox.net/mojave_meteorites/feb1b.jpg
http://members.cox.net/mojave_meteorites/feb1c.jpg

And so a thought has occurred to me: what are the chances of bending
the Meteoritical Society rules and giving this meteorite the name
"Columbia" or "Columbia 7"? I checked the Catalogue, and surprisingly
there is no meteorite called Columbia. I would be happy to donate the
meteorite to NASA, or alternatively arrange to have it cut into 7
pieces to give to each of the families of the astronauts. It's an
ordinary chondrite, probably an H5 or H6 with some black shock veins
running through it, so it's not particularly rare or interesting to
researchers. It's only claim to uniqueness was that it was found
on February 1st at 11:44am PST, less than 6 hours after I watched
Columbia fly by.

Best,
Rob
Received on Fri 07 Feb 2003 04:54:30 PM PST