Collection highlights
Click on the links below to read more about the meteorites in the Carleton B. Moore collection and view meteorite photos!
Wold Cottage
Wold Cottage is an L6 chondrite that fell in the East Riding of Yorkshire, United Kingdom December 13th of 1795. This meteorite fell at a time when the occurence of rocks falling from the sky was still the subject of heated debate. In fact, though the Wold Cottage meteorite fall was witnessed by several people,…
Almahata Sitta
Almahata Sitta is an anomalous, polymict ureilite (achondrite). Almahata Sitta is the first case in which meteorites have been recovered from a known asteroid that was tracked in space and during its subsequent collision with our planet. The small asteroid 2008 TC3 was first discovered October 6th, 2008, by an automated telescope at Mount Lemmon…
Novo-Urei
Novo-Urei fell September 4th, 1886, in the village of the same name, in Mordovia, Russia. Although three stones were recovered, two were lost, and only 1.9 kg are now preserved in collections. One of the lost specimens was, reportedly, eaten by the villagers who found it! Novo-Urei is the type specimen and namesake of the…
Coorara
Coorara is an L6 chondrite found in 1966 north of Haig, Western Australia. It was within veinlets in this meteorite that the mineral majorite was first identified, in 1970 (Smith & Mason, Science). Majorite is a purple high-pressure garnet with a hardness of 7 – 7 ½. In Coorara, and other chondrite meteorites, it occurs…
Bouvante
Bouvante is a eucrite (monomict breccia) achondrite discovered by a French police officer on July 30th, 1978, while he and his family were picnicking. One 8.3 kg, black fusion-crusted meteorite was recovered from a 50-60 cm deep hole, and was the only specimen found. The Bouvante meteorite has been featured on two different countries’ postage…
Marjalahti
Marjalahti is one of only 4 witnessed pallasite falls. Marjalahti fell June 1st, 1902, in what is now the Republic of Karelia, a federal subject of Russia. Approximately 45 kg were recovered. Upon examination, it was determined that the olivine crystals contained in this pallasite were of such consistently high purity that they should be…
Puerto Lápice
Puerto Lápice is a brecciated eucrite (achondrite). According to the Meteoritical Bulletin (MB 93), a brilliant fireball was visible all over Spain, travelling northward, just before 6 PM on May 10, 2007. The meteorite was tracked by the Spanish Fireball Network and fell in and around an olive grove in Ciudad Real, Castilla-La-Mancha. To date,…
Park Forest
Park Forest is an ordinary chondrite (L5) that fell in the Chicago suburb of Park Forest around midnight on March 26, 2003. This was a huge shower of hundreds of stones, including two that crashed through homes and one that hit a fire station.
Sikhote-Alin
Sikhote-Alin is an iron meteorite that fell spectacularly at 10:38 AM, February 12, 1947, in the Sikhote-Alin Mountains, northeast of Vladivostok, Russia. Witnesses to the fall saw a fireball brighter than the sun, that appeared from the North and then exploded violently at the very low altitude of ~3.5 miles. Fragments of the meteorite were…
Weston
Weston is an H4 ordinary chondrite that fell in Fairfield County, Connecticut on December 14, 1807. Weston has historical significance because it provided proof for American scientists that meteorites fall from the sky at a time when reports of such events were treated with skepticism. For many years, however, Thomas Jefferson (then President of the…
