[meteorite-list] NP Artcle, 03-1971 Allende Meteorite Fall & Moon Rocks

From: MARK BOSTICK <thebigcollector_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Thu Apr 22 10:18:27 2004
Message-ID: <OE59PU47EORxDmilNd70001902c_at_hotmail.com>

Paper: The Coshocton Tribune
City: Coshocton, Ohio
Date: Sunday, March 14, 1971

1969 Meteor Shower Was Boon To Solar Trips
By JOESPEYH L. MYLER
UPI Senior Editor
WASHINGTON (UPI)
About six months before the Apollo 11 astronauts set out for the moon in
1969, a huge fireball exploded over northern Mexico and showered an area
larger than the district of Columbia with more than four tons of rocks from
space.
     For scientists the rocks were a precious gift from a region of the
solar system far more remote than the moon. Except for the trouble and
small expense of going after them, they were free.
     Apollo 11 brought back 45 pounds of lunar rock. The flight cost $355
million.
     Both events, the meteorite fall and the moon trip, have provided new
informatin bearing on the formation of our planetary family 4.5 to 4.7
billion years ago.

Largest Meteor Ever

     The story of the Allende meteorite shower,named for a village in
southern Chihuahua, is told in a recently published report by Smithsonian
Institution scientists who were involved in recovering and processing
samples for laboratory study.
     The fall occurred on the mourning of Feb. 8,1969. It was the largest
stony meteorite ever seen to hit the earth. It entered the atmosphere at a
low angle from the south-southwest at seven miles a second. Air friction
transformed it into a brilliant fireball which explode, raining fiery
fragments on a rural area of the Allende River Valley.
     So far, about two tons of stones from this rich space harvest have been
picked up by scientists, local residents and commerical collectors.
     Smithsonian Institution scientists rushed from Washington to Allende
soon after the fall. They quickly garnered more than 300 pounds of space
rock and prepared samples for analysis in 37 laboratories in 13 countries.
     The total estimated cost of all this collecting and distributing was no
more than $10,000 to $15,000.
     By contrast, the United States have spent about $24 billion on the
Apollo lunar landing project. In addition to the 45 pounds of lunar rock
returned by Apollo 11, Apollo 12, which cost $375 million, brought home 75
pounds of moon rock and Apollo 14 - cost $400 million - returned 96 pounds.
     The scientific reasons for study of meteorites, freely bestowed on
earth from space, and he expensively procured moon rocks and the same -
man's hunger for understanding of how and when his solar system abode came
into being.
     The Apollo program is, of course, more than just a device for going
239,000 miles to the moon and bringing some of it back. Moreover what the
astronauts collect comes from well identified places and thus is susceptible
to the precisely documented examinations that scientists dote on.
     Where did the Allende meteorite come from?
     Presumably it was an errant fragment from the swarm of asteroids which
move around the sun between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter. The "asteroidal
belt" is a region teeming with bits and pieces left over from the original
planet-forming processes or from a planet which broke up after formation as
a result of contending gravitational forces.
     Since Mars and Jupiter at their closest approaches are 35 million and
387 million miles from earth, there is a lot of solar system parking space
for the asteroids, which range in diameter from a few yards to hundreds of
miles.
     Why asteroids or fragments thereof stray far enough from their solar
oribts to hit the earth or the moon or other planets is a puzzle of
"celestial mechanics."
     So the point of departure of the Allende meteorite, unlike that of the
Apollo moon rocks, cannot be pinpointed.
     Nevertheless, according to Dr. Brian Mason of the Smithsonian, Allende
"is a better sample of the solar system" than the moon matter brought back
by the astronauts. It contains "a broader chemical spectrum," a richer
variety of elements and compounds.
     The Allende meteorite was, to say the least, unusual. It was the
largest stony meteorite fall ever observed. Of 2,000 known meteorites, it
belonged to a group of only about a dozen catalogued by science.
     The largest chunk of the Allende fall so far recovered weighted 225
pounds, nine pounds more than the total mass of moon stuff returned by three
Apollo lunar flights.
     The Allende meteorite, for all the scientific excitement it caused, was
not much of a new story at the time. It might have been.
     Considering the thousands of stones rained down on the Allende valley,
it is a wonder nobody got hit. One piece, weighing more than 30 pounds,
landed only four yards from a house in the village of Pueblito de Allende.
     Oddly, the Allende fall turned out to be a great help to the Apollo 11
moon flight. Bits of the meteorite were sent in a matter of weeks to
laboratories in more than a dozen countries.
     Many of there laboratories had just made elaborate prepartions to study
the expected Apollo 11 moon rock samples. Said the Smithsonian:
     "They welcomed as a warm-up the opportunity to run analytical tests on
fresh materials of extra-terrestrial origin."
Received on Fri 14 Feb 2003 11:47:17 AM PST