|  NAVAJO
The Navajo iron meteorite was found in northeast Arizona. Native
Americans living in the area knew about the Navajo meteorite.
They named it Pish le gin e gin – "black iron."
The original meteorite weighed 2200 kg. The specimen in
the UNM Meteorite Museum, which weighs about 1000 kg, is on loan
from the meteorite collection of the Field Museum, Chicago. It
has been cut, polished and etched to show its iron-nickel crystals.
The cut was made at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington,
D.C. The meteorite traveled thousands of miles before this piece
returned closer to home!
When the Navajo specimen was installed in the UNM Meteorite Museum
in 1992, Mrs. Lavine Porter of Rio Rancho, NM saw the story on
the local TV news. She recognized it as the meteorite that her
husband, Marvin Porter, helped to load onto the Chicago train
in 1922. Marvin is the young man on the left in the photograph.
On the back of an accompanying photo he wrote, "The first
time I had my foot on a star."
[above]
Marvin Porter and Max Gurule loading the Navajo iron meteorite
onto a train in 1922.
[top] The Navajo iron meteorite.
This is about half of the original piece that was found
in Arizona. It has been cut, polished and etched to show
the different iron-nickel crystals. This specimen is in
the Meteorite Museum at the University of New Mexico, on
loan from the Field Museum in Chicago. |
|
|  GARABATO
The Garabato meteorite was discovered by a farmer when he was
plowing a field in Garabato, Argentina in 1995. It is an ordinary
chondrite that weighs 160 kg. The meteorite has spectacular features
on its surface that were formed as it fell through the Earth's
atmosphere. The small pits, called regmaglypts, were formed when
the outside layer of rock melted and the melt was scooped away
by the wind. The front of the meteorite, that was pointing forwards
as it fell, is flat. The regmaglypts mark out flow lines that
show which way the meteorite was oriented when it fell.
| [pictured
above] The Garabato ordinary chondrite. The stone shows
regmaglypts and flow features from its journey through the
Earth's atmosphere. This specimen is in the Meteorite Museum
at the University of New Mexico |
|
