[meteorite-list] Total Number of Meteorites?

From: Jeff Grossman <jgrossman_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Tue Dec 6 13:08:19 2005
Message-ID: <7.0.0.16.2.20051206125815.025e0168_at_usgs.gov>

If you take the info in the MetBull database on face value, you find
that there are 581 metric tons of approved plus provisional
meteorites out there, broken down as (rounded to nearest ton):

Irons+stony irons: 521 tons
Ordinary chondrites: 52 tons
Carbonaceous chondrites: 3 tons
HED achondrites: 1 ton
Aubrites: 1 ton
Unclassified: 1 ton
Provisional: 1 ton

Of course, this is really crude, because the masses of some
meteorites, especially those found in many pieces, are not very well known.

jeff

are really given as approximat numbers
At 12:42 PM 12/6/2005, Martin Horejsi wrote:
>Hello Geoff,
>
>Good question. According to the Meteoritical Bulletin Database, as of
>November 19, 2006, there are 31227 valid meteorite names and 2419
>provisional names.
>
>http://tin.er.usgs.gov/meteor/metbull.php
>
>As far as the quote, I am still working on that. Seems to me that I
>read it even before RFS was published.
>
>Cheers,
>
>Martin Horejsi
>
>
>On 12/6/05, Darren Garrison <cynapse_at_charter.net> wrote:
> > On Tue, 6 Dec 2005 10:18:18 -0700, "Notkin" <geoking_at_notkin.net> wrote:
> >
> > >Dear Listees:
> > >
> > >Greetings all. I was interviewed by a reporter today for a follow-up on
> > >the Brenham story, and he asked me a good question, which was along the
> > >lines of: "What is the total known number of different meteorites,
> > >including all Antarctic Finds and all classified NWAs?"
> > >
> >
> > The problem that I see with figuring out that number is the loss
> of pairing info from Antarctica and
> > NWA. Find a hundred meteorites in Antarctica, each gets its own
> number. Find a hundred in the
> > Sikhote-Alin strewnfeild, for example, and they are all counted
> as the same meteorite. So unless
> > each individual piece from each known strewnfeild is counted as a
> seperate meteorite, compairing
> > numbers from known falls to Antarctica and many NWAs is comparing
> apples and disarticulated
> > pomegranate pips.
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> >
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Dr. Jeffrey N. Grossman phone: (703) 648-6184
US Geological Survey fax: (703) 648-6383
954 National Center
Reston, VA 20192, USA
Received on Tue 06 Dec 2005 01:08:15 PM PST