[meteorite-list] sulphurous smell of meteorites (was Temperature of meteorites)

From: JoshuaTreeMuseum <joshuatreemuseum_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Wed, 24 Nov 2010 13:40:11 -0500
Message-ID: <D8EF4507389043219AC0FEB6C23B64A0_at_ET>

Marco:

Ditto that! Last summer I was photographing some crusted Zag in the full
sun when it was 95 degrees out. I was distracted for four or five minutes,
when I came back the meteorites were so hot you could barely hold them in
your hand!

Phil Whitmer

--------------------------------



Piper et al.,

Without implying that ALL reports of sulphurous smells are necessarily
unreliable, I do urge caution.

Over my career of checking alleged Dutch new meteorite falls (all
meteorwrongs!)
there have been a number of cases where people reported to me "sulphurous
smells" when encountering the stone. Mind you: all of these were *not*
meteorites, but things ranging from flint to brick to slag.

Like "red glowing", the "sulphorous smells" are something that people
apparently
expect with true meteorites. So they tend to "observe" it, even if the
object
later turns out to be not a meteorite but an earthly object!

Never underestimate the power of suggestion.

The same goes for reports of "very hot" meteorites.

Concerning the latter: when a fall takes place in bright sunlight, be aware
that
after the fall the stone will quickly get "hot" simply because the black
fusion
crust absorbs warmth from sunlight, in the same way that tarmac or a dark
painted garden bench do. I 'discovered' this several years ago when placing
a
few fragments of Mbale in sunlight for a few minutes for a photograph. When
I
picked them up I almost dropped them again because of a sensation of them
being
"hot" (on second inspection, they weren't actually that hot, but they did
clearly warm up in the sunlight enough for this initial sensation to occur).

In more speculative moments, I have pondered a few times whether the decay
of
very shortlived radioisotopes in meteorites could play a role in reports of
"glowing" and "hot" fresh-fallen meteorites as well. That is pure
speculation
that will probably not hold on closer scrutiny, however.

- Marco

-----
Dr Marco (asteroid 183294) Langbroek
Dutch Meteor Society (DMS)
Received on Wed 24 Nov 2010 01:40:11 PM PST