[meteorite-list] Mifflin, Amiss

From: drtanuki <drtanuki_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Sat, 7 May 2011 19:31:42 -0700 (PDT)
Message-ID: <911108.39031.qm_at_web161213.mail.bf1.yahoo.com>

Jason,
You raise several good points and analysis. One further question that should be asked is how many grams of this rock were put into the market as Mifflin? And have they made their way into the "gene pool" to how many buyers and sellers and yet to reproduce more offspring? Dirk Ross...Tokyo


--- On Sun, 5/8/11, jason utas <jasonutas at gmail.com> wrote:

> From: jason utas <jasonutas at gmail.com>
> Subject: [meteorite-list] Mifflin, Amiss
> To: "Meteorite-list" <meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com>
> Date: Sunday, May 8, 2011, 10:12 AM
> Hello All,
>
> My story begins in the summer of last year.? I saw
> some strange pieces
> of 'Mifflin' on ebay that I thought looked funny.?
> People were talking
> about the meteorite having two lithologies, but...the
> slices and
> individuals that I saw looked 'off.'? A select few
> looked like
> H-chondrites, and they had the telltale signs of wear that
> freshly-imported Moroccan falls bear: worn edges, exposed
> metal flakes
> on protruding corners (where the fusion crust had been worn
> off due to
> improper packing), etc.
>
> At the time, I did nothing but send a private email to Anne
> Black
> notifying her of my suspicions.? I spoke with some
> other prominent
> list-members addressing it, and they all agreed that the
> material
> looked funny, but that nothing could be done about it given
> the
> required burden of proof.
>
> So, I sat on my hands for several months.
>
> Just over a month ago, I saw a piece of the funny-looking
> 'Mifflin' on
> ebay. It looked similar to some pieces that I remembered
> seeing on
> ebay months before, and, being an end-cut, I was able to
> see both the
> stone's funny-looking inside -- and the apparent metal
> grains on the
> stone's exterior.
>
> I used the 'buy-it-now' option to purchase the end-cut, and
> it
> arrived while Peter and I were in Morocco.? When we
> returned, I
> promptly shipped the end-cut off to Tony Irving of the
> University of
> Washington; he agreed to analyze the stone posthaste.
>
> The results came back, but Tony wanted to wait until the
> probe was
> recallibrated so that he could run it again to be sure.
>
> Lo and behold, he did confirm that my end-cut was an
> equilibrated
> H-chondrite, with an olivine Fa of 18.6.? For
> comparison, Chergach and
> Bassikounou both have Fa contents of 18.4 and 18.6,
> respectively.
>
> University of Madison, Wisconsin performed most of the work
> on the
> Mifflin fall.? Between them and the Field Museum, over
> twenty separate
> stones were analyzed.? They were all L5.? Mifflin
> is classified as an
> L5, with an Fa of ~24.9 +/- 0.2.
>
> I then sent Tony the link to the ebay auction so he could
> confirm that
> the piece that he had analyzed was indeed the piece that I
> had sent
> him.? He did.
>
> I purchased my end-cut from Bryan Scarborough (IMCA), who
> purchased it
> from Michael Cottingham, who purchased it from Greg
> Catterton (IMCA),
> who purchased the stone with Carl Esparza from the finder.
>
> Carl told me the following story over the phone:
> He was contacted "out of the blue" by someone hunting in
> the Mifflin
> strewn-field.? According to Carl, the finder stated
> that he thought
> there was a "conspiracy against him," because no one would
> offer him
> more than $5/g. and he believed his finds were worth more
> than that.
> So, according to Carl, he then offered the finder $10/g,
> and a deal was
> struck.
>
> But...the finder asked that he not be paid via paypal or
> wire
> transfer; he wanted cash mailed to a P.O. Box.
>
> So, Carl mailed the money to the P.O. Box and the first of
> two 'Mifflin'
> stones was over-nighted to him the next day.? It
> should be noted that
> Carl included Greg Catterton as his partner in this deal,
> and Greg
> sent over several hundred dollars to help pay for the
> stones.
>
> Unfortunately, as Carl said over the phone, his old
> computer recently
> died, so he lacks the name and email address of the finder,
> as well as
> the number/address of the P.O. Box to which he sent the
> money.? Carl
> is also unwilling to share the bank receipt from the
> transaction which
> would prove that he did make a large cash withdrawal for
> the stones.
> I asked Carl for the finder's phone number, but he told me
> that he had
> recently tried to call the finder, himself, only to find
> that the
> number had been disconnected.
> He was unwilling to share the number with me, regardless.
>
> On the phone, Carl suggested that his source had likely
> ripped him
> off, and he said that he believed that it was the reason
> why he had
> been asked to send the money untraceably, as he did; Carl
> described
> the situation as a "typical scam."
>
> He also suggested that the stones *might* be from an
> unrelated fall --
> or could be the result of Mifflin being an 'Almahata Sitta
> sort of
> fall.'
>
> I can't disprove either of those ideas, but they are
> unlikely for the
> following reasons:
>
> 1) Almahata Sitta is a unique event in the history of
> meteoritics.
> Different lithologies have been observed in many
> meteorites, but to
> have individual stones of completely different and
> unrelated meteorite
> types falling separately is unique.? Out of the 1,238
> accepted
> observed falls in the meteoritical bulletin, only one has
> exhibited
> individuals that have consisted of different meteorite
> types (for
> example, H + L, Ureilite + EH, etc).
>
> And it's not that we haven't been looking for similar
> events; with
> each and every fall, multiple stones are analyzed, and the
> simple fact
> of the matter is that they are always similar...with *one*
> exception.
>
> So, Almahata Sitta is an exception.? How much of an
> exception?? 0.08%
> of meteorite falls are like it.? Less than a tenth of
> a percent.
> Possible...but extremely unlikely.? We also have to
> wonder about why
> or how this hunter managed to find the only two H's from
> the fall that
> were recognized.? Over twenty other stones were
> studied and this
> finder supposedly turned up two or three that were all
> H's.? It's 'funny.'
>
> The other possibility that Carl advocated is that the
> stones may actually
> have been found in Wisconsin -- and they may be part of a
> new fall that
> somehow slipped under the radar.? He initially
> suggested that they were
> from the fireball widely seen across the Midwest on May
> 10th, but, at the
> time, I had paypal records from Greg that stated that he
> had sent Carl the
> money for the stones as early as April 24th.
> So we ruled out that possibility..
>
> But, I agree; the stones could theoretically have come from
> a
> different fall.? The end-cut that I bought showed no
> visible signs of
> weathering.? No oxide, no anything.? Given the
> weather in and around
> Mifflin at the time of the fall, we can assume that the
> stones were
> picked up within a week or so of having fallen.? No
> AMS reports of
> anything in the region for the given timeframe doesn't
> disprove
> anything since meteorites often fall without much ado,
> but...two falls
> in the same place *at the same time?*
> Granted, it's possible.? Not very likely, though.
>
> And you've still got to wonder about why no one else found
> any
> H-chondrites while looking for Mifflin.? It's not like
> meteorites were
> laying thickly on the ground.? Everyone who found
> stones out there put
> considerable time into hunting -- and they all found only
> L5's.? So if
> Carl's source were telling the truth, and he did find the
> stones, it
> seems best to assume that he wasn't hunting in the Mifflin
> strewn-field, because, if he were, he would 1) probably
> have found
> L5's, and 2) other people would probably have found H's as
> well.
>
> The conclusion I draw from this is that the truth has
> become
> well-hidden.? What is certain is that I have been
> refunded by
> Bryan, and I know for a fact that Bryan has been refunded
> by
> Michael Cottingham, who has in turn been refunded by Greg
> Catterton.
>
> What I have heard, however, is that Carl has been defending
> the
> legitimacy of his stones, and is refusing to refund Greg
> Catterton.
>
> Regardless of whether the material is Mifflin or another
> meteorite
> (from Wisconsin or from NWA -- it doesn't matter), the
> simple fact
> of the matter is that the material sold by Carl has been
> shown to be
> different from how it was advertised, and as such, he
> should be
> willing to accept its return for a refund.? If he
> wishes to get it
> analyzed and sell it to others as a new meteorite, that is
> his
> concern.
>
> I am fairly certain that Bryan, Michael, and Greg
> unknowingly sold the
> material as Mifflin, believing that it was indeed what they
> sold it
> as.
>
> That is my 2 cents.
>
> Regards,
> Jason Utas
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Received on Sat 07 May 2011 10:31:42 PM PDT