[meteorite-list] Scientific Value of Carancas Crater Research

From: Sterling K. Webb <sterling_k_webb_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Tue, 16 Oct 2007 20:01:27 -0500
Message-ID: <091e01c81059$3fccf6b0$b92ee146_at_ATARIENGINE>

Hi, All,

    The notion that an impactor survives somehow
to lurk beneath the floor of a crater is a pervasive and
common notion that seems to have "the power to
cloud men's minds" and keep them digging and drilling.
Daniel Moreau Barringer, owner of the Meteor Crater,
exhausted his life on the crusade to "mine" the meteorite,
drilling as deep as 1400 feet into the floor of the crater.

    A piece on the remarkable drilling efforts
Barringer undertook in the crater, by James Tobin:
http://homepages.ihug.co.nz/~afs/feb97_1.html
    "The work at the Arizona crater would continue
for more than two decades, even beyond Barringer's
death in 1929. But, even by the time of his 1909 paper
there had already been 28 holes drilled into the floor of
the crater. Fourteen of these revealed nickel iron oxide
material at various depths below 450 feet. At the same
time the numbered shafts at the crater had already reached
into the forties. Add to this the dozens of trenches
and pits being dug almost constantly into the ejecta
blanket and this becomes a staggering project."
    It's a long and fascinating article.

    Tobin himself is convinced that some meteoritic masses
remain below the crater floor. In another fascinating article:
http://www.meteorite-times.com/Back_Links/2005/February/Jims_Fragments.htm
    "...it is clear only a few percent of the original mass
remains. Most of the asteroid was indeed vaporized,
later condensing to form the billions of small spheres
found in the soil around the crater. Barringer and Tilghman
knew about the spheres from the beginning of their
work. But, thought them to be tiny droplets that streamed
from the burning asteroid as it plunged through the
atmosphere. Even as evidence mounted that the asteroid
could not have survived intact, Barringer found ways
to think it was there."

    In 1938, even Time magazine had an opinion on the
formation of Meteor Crater! Here's a fascinating look at how
little was known of craters, meteorites, and impacts back then:
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,931100,00.html
    Here's what they thought the mechanism of crater
formation was: "the monstrous cluster [of meteors]
plunged into the desert, converted underground water
into steam, hurled huge gobs of earth and stone skyward
to fall back into the crater." This in an article about
investors that were still scheming to recover the "millions
of tons" of precious meteorite buried under the crater.


Sterling K. Webb
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
----- Original Message -----
From: <bernd.pauli at paulinet.de>
To: <meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com>
Sent: Tuesday, October 16, 2007 4:29 PM
Subject: [meteorite-list] Scientific Value of Carancas Crater Research


Sterling wrote:

"That does not sound like material that would survive any
substantial impact force."

Yes, that may "unfortunately" be right. Much or most of it
may have been vaporized or been reduced to dust and what
has been collected may be comparable to what has been found
around Barringer Crater (Coone Butte) where any search for
the main mass down in the crater has so far remained futile!

.. sayeth Bernd who meanwhile owns two small but
representative pieces of that noteworthy meteorite ;-)

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Received on Tue 16 Oct 2007 09:01:27 PM PDT