[meteorite-list] Park Forest Article in Chicago Tribune

nakhladog_at_meteoritecentral.com

--
Rob Wesel
------------------
We are the music makers...and we 
are the dreamers of the dreams.
Willy Wonka, 1971
> And what's the point of wasting space with that old hat?
> 
> > --------------------
> > `Park Forest Meteorite Fall': One year, many deals later
> > --------------------
> > 
> > By Sean D. Hamill
> > Special to the Tribune
> > 
> > March 26, 2004
> > 
> > "Kaahhh-boooOOOMMMM!"
> > 
> > An instant before a light lit up the sky over Chicago's southern suburbs
> > just before midnight on March 26, 2003, a sonic boom walloped the air.
> > 
> > Then came dozens of flourishes in quick succession, as if it were the finale
> > of the 4th of July fireworks.
> > 
> > "Ka-POW! Ka-POW! Ka-POW! Ka-POW!"
> > 
> > At the time, no one could have known that these sights and sounds, centered
> > over the middle-class town of Park Forest, foretold a whirlwind of greed for
> > some, salvation for others and an education for all.
> > 
> > "It was definitely unique in that it was the most populous area ever struck
> > by a fall of this size," said Menakshi Wadhwa, the Field Museum's meteorite
> > curator. "For a meteorite curator, what better thing could you ask for?"
> > 
> > Meteorites hit the Earth all the time. And through history some have hit
> > cars, homes and even cows. But, in large part because 70 percent of the
> > globe is covered in water, never before have so many meteorites hit all at
> > once in such a densely populated area.
> > 
> > Still, it might have been easy to miss the story. Coming a week after the
> > beginning of the present Persian Gulf war, it played on the inside pages of
> > most newspapers, including the Chicago Tribune, and generated small reports
> > on local television and radio. Soon, the story faded from view.
> > 
> > In the simplest terms, meteorites are fragments of a meteor that has broken
> > up as it entered Earth's atmosphere. Meteors are generally considered
> > smaller than asteroids, and both are stony, metal-laden objects with
> > important stories to tell.
> > 
> > "The processes that formed this meteor are the processes present at the very
> > beginning of the solar system," said the Indian-born Wadhwa, one of the
> > world's foremost meteorite authorities. "If you can understand what went
> > into it, you can understand the building blocks of what went into the
> > creation of our own planet."
> > 
> > Peter Brown, assistant professor of astronomy at Western Ontario University
> > in Canada, refers to the Park Forest object as a "meteoroid" because he now
> > believes, based on his studies over the last year, that when it entered the
> > atmosphere it weighed up to 10 tons and was about 5 feet in diameter.
> > 
> > While Wadhwa has focused on trying to figure out what the meteor is made up
> > of and how it was made, Brown has been trying to figure out exactly where it
> > came from. The Park Forest meteor "is pretty important," Brown said. "It's
> > only the eighth time ever where we've made an accurate orbit of a
> > meteoroid."
> > 
> > Brown and his colleagues are convinced it came from the asteroid belt
> > between Mars and Jupiter, but, at some point in its 4.6 billion-year life,
> > it was struck by something that threw it into a much longer elliptical
> > orbit.
> > 
> > "Once that happened, it's just a matter of time before it hits the Earth, or
> > heads into the sun, or gets knocked out of the solar system," he said.
> > 
> > Despite astronomical odds, this meteor headed here.
> > 
> > Fortunately for residents of the southwest suburbs, this meteor was an "L5,"
> > or low iron, chondrite meteor, said Wadhwa, who recently completed a
> > scientific paper on the meteor with University of Chicago assistant
> > professor Steve Simon.
> > 
> > These are among the most common meteors, and unlike some heavy iron meteors,
> > they largely disintegrate before they hit the Earth.
> > 
> > 44,000 m.p.h.
> > 
> > When it hit the Earth's atmosphere Brown estimates it was traveling up to
> > 44,000 m.p.h. Thousands of pieces were scattered over a six-mile-wide field
> > that stretched from Olympia Fields to Crete, but centered over Park Forest.
> > 
> > "Three things make meteorite collectors excited," said Michael Blood, a
> > meteorite dealer from San Diego. "If it was a witnessed fall, if it hit
> > something, and if it's a rare petrographical type."
> > 
> > "This wasn't [petrographically] rare, but it was witnessed and hit a number
> > of things," said Blood, 58, who has been dealing in stones from space for 15
> > years. "This was the biggest event in modern times among the meteorite
> > collecting community."
> > 
> > Within a few hours of the fall, about 30 major meteorite collectors and
> > dealers from around the globe were headed to Chicago.
> > 
> > "People thought they were going to be millionaires," said Adam Hupe, a
> > meteorite collector from Renton, Wash., who made it to Park Forest the day
> > after the fall but left just a few days later because the price was too
> > high. "I told people to call us when all the hype died down."
> > 
> > Within days after the "Park Forest Meteorite Fall" as it has become known,
> > the price quickly rose from $1 a gram (meteorites are always sold by the
> > metric weight of grams) to $20.
> > 
> > It wasn't just collectors and dealers driving the price up, either.
> > Scientists like Wadhwa joined the fray.
> > 
> > She eventually bought five meteorites, but one that she and many other
> > museums would love to have is one Blood is trying to sell on consignment for
> > brothers Adam and Greg Hupe.
> > 
> > Garzas gain reknown
> > 
> > Known as "the Garza Stone," it is the most famous of all the fragments that
> > crashed to Earth in Park Forest.
> > 
> > It was named after the family whose home the 5-pound rock smashed into,
> > creating a hole in the roof before it bounced around the second floor and
> > came to rest a few feet from the head of the homeowners' 14 year-old son.
> > 
> > (It's the habit of meteorite collectors to give unofficial names to some
> > stones that have a history behind them, so that, in addition to the Garza
> > Stone, other large meteorites from Park Forest have been tagged "the curb
> > smasher" and "the fence buster" among others.)
> > 
> > The Garza Stone gained fame not only because it crashed through a roof, but
> > because it had a great public-relations machine behind it in homeowner Noe
> > Garza, who spent nearly all of the day after the meteorite fall talking to
> > everyone and anyone who showed up to interview him.
> > 
> > "I enjoyed it," said Garza, a steelworker who works in Chicago Heights. "I
> > wasn't camera shy at all. I like to talk."
> > 
> > He also likes to deal.
> > 
> > For more than a month after the fall, Garza played four of the world's most
> > prominent meteorite dealers against each other before accepting an offer for
> > the stone.
> > 
> > Though Garza won't say exactly what he was paid, other meteorite dealers
> > believe he received about $20 per gram for the stone from the Hupes, which
> > works out to $46,000 -- a figure Garza didn't dispute.
> > 
> > But the buying didn't stop there. The Hupes and another dealer, Jim Lang,
> > bought just about everything the meteorite touched, including the roof and
> > ceiling with the hole in it, the window sill it dented, the shards of glass
> > from the mirror it broke, even the window blinds it ripped through.
> > 
> > "My $10 blinds I bought at Menards, they gave me $200 for them," Garza
> > recalled. "I'm like . . . I'll take it!"
> > 
> > The idea, said Adam Hupe, was that with the stone and the pieces of the home
> > it hit put together, the Hupes and Lang could re-create the home in an
> > interactive exhibit that they could tour around the country to make money.
> > 
> > But earlier this year, after Lang and Hupes couldn't agree on the
> > parameters, the deal fell apart and the Hupes -- who haven't fulfilled
> > Wadhwa's prediction of slicing the meteorite up -- put it up for sale
> > through Blood at $25 a gram, or $58,000. It has yet to sell.
> > 
> > Though Adam Hupe said he could get up to $125 a gram by slicing up the rock,
> > he said he'll never do that -- "That's like cutting into history."
> > 
> > Though Hupe doesn't intend to cut up his rock, others have. Slices of a gram
> > or less -- cut in thin slices to make it easier for regular collectors to
> > buy -- of Park Forest meteorites continue to show up for sale on the
> > Internet and eBay, routinely selling for about $40 to $50 a gram.
> > 
> > The Illinois Department of Human Services still owns two large rocks: a
> > 2-pounder found the morning after the fall, and a 5-pounder found on a
> > department roof in August during a regular inspection.
> > 
> > And the largest chunk yet -- an 11-pounder -- was found two months after the
> > fall in a back yard on the edge of the Olympia Fields Golf Course.
> > 
> > Steve Arnold, a meteorite broker from Kingston, Ark., is trying to sell the
> > 11-pounder for the man who found it, at a price of $50,000.
> > 
> > In the hunt
> > 
> > The discovery, though, has only enticed more meteorite hunters to return to
> > look for the "main mass," a stone weighing perhaps hundreds of pounds, which
> > some believe still lies out there somewhere in one of the many forest
> > preserves in the south suburbs.
> > 
> > "Everyone would love to find it," said Arnold, who intends to return this
> > summer to look for smaller stones. "But, nothing else has shown up lately,
> > and a year later, odds are that it won't unless it's accidental."
> > 
> > After the fall last year, it took more than a month for the major ruckus to
> > die down in town. But even now, meteorite enthusiasts, and simple curiosity
> > seekers, continue to stop by asking for directions to particular locations,
> > said Police Chief Francis DioGuardi.
> > 
> > "It was crazy," said the 33-year veteran of the department. "When we were
> > holding most of the meteorites [while investigating what they were], it was
> > like we were the keepers of the royal jewels."
> > 
> > The first few hours of that event will forever stay with DioGuardi, who was
> > home sleeping when he got a call just after midnight.
> > 
> > "They called to tell me there was this large flash in the sky and some
> > citizens say something hit their house and we think it might be a meteorite.
> > Well, OK," he said with a laugh.
> > 
> > "But then there's this realization that this was a once-in-a-lifetime
> > experience," he said. "And it definitely was."
> > 
> > 
> > Copyright (c) 2004, Chicago Tribune
> > 
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