[meteorite-list] New Ultra Rare Martian Subgroup

From: Adam Hupe <adamhupe_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Thu Apr 22 10:32:05 2004
Message-ID: <022501c3e0b9$5f723e40$3ec01018_at_attbi.com>

Dear List Members,

Congratulations to anybody who has any NWA 1195 or NWA 2046 in their
collections. Additional study has proven these two Martian meteorites to be
even more impressive than originally stated. The very strange elongated
shape of NWA 1195 should have given the first clue that there was more to
this stone than what was first observed.

The reason NWA 1195 survived reentry through the atmosphere with such an
aerodynamically unstable elongated shape is that the crystals are
preferentially aligned. Think of it as the grains of wood in a baseball
bat. If a baseball bat were cut against the grain it would break every time
a ball was hit. Since baseball bats are cut with the grain they are much
stronger.

Since most meteorites do not have grain the natural thing to do is it cut
them perpendicular to the longest dimension as was done with NWA 1195.
While the study of the new and equally impressive Martian meteorite NWA 2046
was being conducted orthopyroxe was discovered in aligned phenocrysts.
Since the two stones are somewhat similar but definitely not paired more
study was conducted on NWA 1195 and these same oriented grains were found.
They were probably missed during initial study because they were cut
perpendicular to their length providing a tiny surface area to observe. If
NWA 1195 were sliced 90 degrees to the original cut these elongated crystals
would have been discovered immediately as in NWA 2046.

What all this means is that a new subgroup now exists called
"Olivine-Orthopyroxene-Phyric Shergottite". These two meteorites represent
the most primitive Martian lava yet discovered. With only two unpaired
members and a combined weight of only 378 grams this is the rarest Martian
subgroup in existence.

Before we forget, we would like to congratulate the other team who brought
back NWA2046, the 30th Martian meteorite discovered.


Wishing everybody the best,

Adam and Greg Hupe
The Hupe Collection
IMCA 2185
Received on Thu 22 Jan 2004 02:28:46 AM PST