[meteorite-list] Czech this out-- NEA 003 lunar

From: Darren Garrison <cynapse_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Fri, 26 Jan 2007 21:53:14 -0500
Message-ID: <7eflr29us64vt4nisqd3ke47pnkurulls5_at_4ax.com>

http://www.radio.cz/en/article/87671

Meteorite's origin traced by Czech geologists
[26-01-2007] By Daniela Lazarova
Every year new meteorites are found on different parts of planet Earth. They
travel for millions of years and it is usually impossible to say where they came
from - but in just one case Czech geologists think they know - North-East Africa
003 is believed to have originally come from the Sea of Rains on the moon.
 North-East Africa 003, photo: Jakub HalodaIt traveled for 160 million years
before getting sucked in by Earth's gravitation and landed somewhere in the
Libyan Desert where it was later found by a Czech geologist and collector. Since
only about 50 meteorites which have made it to planet Earth are known to have
come from the Moon - North East Africa 003 was a significant find. But there was
more to come. Czech geologists have been studying its make-up and comparing it
to data available from various lunar projects. And it was the 1994 Clementine
spacecraft research project which provided the answer.
Jakub Haloda of the Czech Geological Society says that a comparison of its
findings and the make-up of the moonstone /a course-grained, low-Ti olivine rich
basalt / indicates that it could only have come from one place on the moon - the
Sea of Rains, also known as the Sea of Showers, a lava flooded giant crater. The
information is doubly precious - not only is North East Africa 003 the only
moonstone the origin of which geologists have been able to trace, but the
findings moreover suggest that lava flowed over the moon's surface much earlier
than originally thought.
North East Africa 003 was exhibited at the Stefanik Observatory in Prague in
2004 - just two years after it was found. Now it is once again hot news -and
there are many who would like to get a glimpse of it. However the moonstone
remains in private hands - and the collector in question wishes to remain in
anonymity.
Received on Fri 26 Jan 2007 09:53:14 PM PST