agencyvilla.blogg.se - Real meteorite

Some of these, particularly desert varnish, can look remarkably like a meteorite fusion crust.

There are numerous processes on Earth that cause rocks to have rinds, coatings, and crusts.

If it has some kind of rind, coating, or crust, then the rind, coating, or crust is probably not a meteorite fusion crust and the rock is not a meteorite If she is wearing shorts and jogging down the beach with her dog, then she might be a concert pianist, but probably not. Put another way, if she is wearing a pretty dress and playing a grand piano on a stage with a symphony orchestra behind her, then she is probably a concert pianist.

If a rock does not have a fusion crust, then there is no reason to suspect that it is a meteorite no matter how many other meteorite-like features it may have.

Usually there is some adhering fusion crust.

Some meteorites do not have obvious fusion crusts, but that is rare unless the meteorite is from a hot desert and it fell thousands of years ago.

meteorite fusion crust | fusion crusts look like this | or like this.

If it does not have a fusion crust, then it is probably not a meteorite

Here are some other real meteorites that do not look much like meteorites, except to an experienced collector.Īpps such as Google Lens do not and cannot reliably identify photos of rocks as meteorites.

If someone had walked into my office with Kalahari 009, I would have said that it was not a meteorite.

Some meteorites do not look like meteorites There is no polite way to say this – most people who contact me saying, “It looks like a meteorite to me” do not know what to look for. Achondrites such as meteorites from asteroids, Moon, and Mars can look very much like some types of common rocks from Earth. It is often not possible to determine whether a rock is a meteorite just from its appearance, particularly in a photograph.Not every rock that “looks like” a meteorite is actually a meteorite Most rocks that fall from the sky are not meteorites.Not everything that falls from the sky is a meteorite It requires triangulation from several viewpoints, usually with cameras. Meteorite fragments land far from where you last saw the meteor and there is no way that observers at a single point on the Earth’s surface are going to find fragments of the meteorite.If you saw a meteor and later found a stone, then the stone is not a meteorite It is like lightning – You cannot hold a meteor in your hand.If you found a rock, it might be a meteorite, but it is definitely not a meteor It requires sophisticated chemical or mineralogical tests to distinguish a rock as an achondrite and to identify just what type of achondrite the rock is. Achondrites (meteorites from the Moon and Mars are achondrites) look like terrestrial rocks.If there is no fusion crust, then neither you nor I can identify a rock as an achondrite just “by looking” at it No lunar meteorite has yet been found in North America, South America, or Europe.

Only about 7 in 1000 meteorites is from the Moon and 5 in 1000 is from Mars.The chance of finding a lunar or martian meteorite is even smaller Even when a meteorite is observed to fall, experienced meteorite hunters may find only a few stones when hunting dawn to dusk for a week. Only 137 of those occurred in North America. Since 1900, the numbers of recognized meteorite “falls” is about 814 for the whole Earth.The chance of finding a meteorite that has just fallen is even smaller Even experienced meteorite hunters can go for years between finds.About two thirds of meteorites found in the United States have been found in arid regions of California, Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, and Kansas. Since 1900, about 1800 meteorites have been found in North America.The chance of finding a meteorite is exceedingly small Think of it this way: If you see it driving down the freeway and it has 4 wheels, 2 headlights, and a trunk, then it is probably an automobile, not an alien spacecraft.I am sent photos of dozens of meteorwrongs every day.The links give more details and contain photos related to the point I am stating. Nearly all of the photos in the links below were sent to me by persons inquiring whether the object in the photo was a meteorite.