Buseck Center for Meteorite Studies

Buzzard Coulee is an ordinary (H4) chondrite that fell November 20th, 2008, in rural Saskatchewan, Canada. The associated fireball was quite visible, and was witnessed by several; according to the Meteoritical Bulletin (MB 95): "A bright fireball was widely observed across Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba during late twilight on November 20, 2008. The fireball and…

Looking back at history-making chemistry that's out of this world October 6, 2021 It was 60 years ago, in 1961, and the space race was on. Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin became the first man in space, followed weeks later by American astronaut Alan Shepard. President John F. Kennedy challenged the nation to land a man…

The afternoon of August 1, 2020, residents of Sumatra's Central Tapanuli Regency heard loud booming sounds that shook their houses. A single stone weighing over 2 kg (~4.5 lb) went through the roof of a house in the town of Kolang, embedding itself in the soil beside the house. A second stone fell in a…

Peekskill is an ordinary (H6) chondrite that fell October 9, 1992, in New York. How would you feel if a meteorite wrecked your car? According to the Meteoritical Bulletin (MB 75), after a fireball and a loud noise the evening of October 9, 1992, a meteorite weighing over 12 kg (~26.5 lb) fell on a…

In 2017, Center Meteorite Curator Dr. Laurence Garvie published a ground-breaking paper in the journal Icarus. Co-authored with former Center Assistant Director and astrophysicist Dr. Melissa Morris and School of Earth and Space Exploration Professor (now Emeritus) and sedimentologist Dr. Paul Knauth, the paper (Sedimentary laminations in the Isheyevo (CH/CBb) carbonaceous chondrite formed by gentle…