[meteorite-list] Rare space rock goes unnoticed for 140 years - space - 13 December 2013 - New Scientist

From: Marco Langbroek <marco.langbroek_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Sat, 14 Dec 2013 19:27:25 +0100
Message-ID: <52ACA30D.4050409_at_online.nl>

> Hi listoids,
>
> No "Diepenveen", as the meteorite is now officially called, in the Met Bull, sorry.
> Best regards.
> Michel Franco
> IMCA 3869


That's because the meteorite still has to be submitted. It's not an official
name yet.

It will probably be submitted in the next few weeks after some additional
microprobe work to complement earlier preliminary work.

I am one of the PI's on this meteorite.

The meteorite is "officially" the 5th meteorite of the Netherlands in the sense
that we have established it is a meteorite indeed, a CM Carbonaceous meteorite
more exactly, and not paired to a known meteorite.

Last Thursday, the former owner of the meteorite in a ceremony handed over the
stone to the Dutch National Museum of Natural History in Leiden, with press
present, hence why it is in the news now.

For some pictures of the stone, see here:

http://home.online.nl/marco.langbroek/diepnl.html

(apologies that there is only a Dutch text for the moment)

More news on this meteorite somewhere next year when we have completed several
analysis. Besides our VU University Amsterdam, several international
institutions are involved (Oxygen isotopes were done at UNM for example and CRE
at UC Berkeley) and research is still ongoing.

This is the 5th surviving meteorite of the Netherlands but the third
chronologically if we look at the fall date, 27 October 1873. Chronologically it
is the 2nd witnessed CM fall, after Cold Bokkeveld.

For those of you who master Dutch, there is a TV news item in Dutch about the
handover ceremony here, including some short snippets of interview with me, the
former owner, and the amateur astronomer who basically 'rediscovered' it in the
former owner's rock collection 139 years after it fell:

http://youtu.be/8IPR9vrQoR4

There is only one stone (a half stone actually: 50-65% fusion crust), originally
weighing 68 grams before sampling. It came in a wooden box with a beautiful
hand-written label with details including location, date, time, phenomena, name
of the person who picked it up etcetera. With some additional archive research,
we can pinpoint the fall location to a few hundred yards.

Cheers,

- Marco


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Dr Marco Langbroek

Faculty of Earth and Life Sciences
VU University Amsterdam
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Received on Sat 14 Dec 2013 01:27:25 PM PST