Click on the links below to read more about the meteorites in the Center's collection, and view meteorite photos!
Chitado
October's Meteorite of the Month is Chitado, an ordinary (L6) chondrite that fell in the province of Cunene, southwest Angola. According to the Meteoritical Bulletin (MB 53): On October 20, 1966, a shower of meteorites fell near Chitado, within an area of approximately 6 km2. Several stones weighing several hundred grams each and a few […]
Plantersville
September's Meteorite of the Month is Plantersville, an ordinary (H6) chondrite that fell in Texas the afternoon of September 4, 1930. In his 1937 American Mineralogist research article, Professor John Lonsdale described the circumstances of the meteorite fall, as recounted to him by witnesses: This locality is forested and only the fact that six men […]
Springwater
August's Meteorite of the Month is Springwater, a pallasite (PMG-an) found in Saskatchewan, Canada. In August of 1931, Harvey H. Nininger received the first of several masses of the Springwater meteorite from citizens of Springwater, Saskatchewan, which is approximately 100 miles west of the city of Saskatoon. He later described the meteorite in American Mineralogist: […]
Ramsdorf
July's Meteorite of the Month is Ramsdorf, an ordinary (L6) chondrite that fell in Germany, the evening of July 26, 1958. According to the Meteoritical Bulletin (MB 13): The meteorite fell from a clear sky and neither light nor percussion phenomena were observed. The fall was accompanied by a noise similar to that of propeller; […]
NWA 725
June's Meteorite of the Month is Northwest Africa 725 (NWA 725), an acapulcoite achondrite found in Morocco. As defined by the Meteoritical Society, members of the acapulcoite-lodranite group of meteorites are equigranular primitive achondrites that show subchondritic compositions, with mineral assemblages similar to, but distinct from, ordinary chondrites. Acapulcoites are finer grained than lodranites and […]
Zhob
Zhob is an ordinary (H3-4) chondrite, that fell the evening of January 9, 2020, near Baluchistan, Pakistan. Zhob was recently classified by ASU Center for Meteorite Studies Curator Laurence Garvie. According to the Meteoritical Bulletin (MB 109): A bright fireball followed by sonic booms was seen and heard around the northern part of the […]
Kayakent
April's Meteorite of the Month is Kayakent, an iron (IIIAB) that fell in April of 1961, near the village of Kayakent, Turkey. Photo © ASU/CMS: The cross-hatched structure in the metal (called Widmanstätten pattern) in this sample indicates extremely slow cooling, on the order of 10o Celsius per million years. The meteorite was […]
Peckelsheim
Peckelsheim is an achondrite (diogenite-pm) that fell the afternoon of March 3, 1953. According to the Meteoritical Bulletin (MB 46), a group of workers in the forest outside of Peckelsheim, Germany, heard "a whine similar to that of shell-splinter" around 2:30 PM. The meteorite hit a tree branch, and landed at the feet of the […]
Paragould
February 17, 2020, marked the 90th anniversary of the fall of the Paragould meteorite, an ordinary (LL5) chondrite that landed in Arkansas during the early morning hours of February 17, 1930. The fall was observed by several witnesses hundreds of miles from the meteorite's eventual landing site in Paragould, Arkansas. These included the engineer […]
Benton
Benton is an (LL6) ordinary chondrite that fell in York County, New Brunswick, in 1949. The Benton meteorite's fiery entry into Earth's atmosphere was witnessed January 16, in overcast twilight conditions, and the meteorite itself was quickly collected. Benton is the only meteorite from New Brunswick. To date, 2.84 kg (6¼ lb) have been recovered.
