[Rockhounds] A most exciting method of collecting...

[J. R. Hodel]

Waiting for a rock to fall from the sky and explode just above a rural community!

I saw a noteworthy meteor back in 1969, my (then girlfriend) wife and I were driving to my parent's house after work around midnight, and the landscape lit up brighter than mid-day.  We each leaned out the car windows and looked up to see a streak of brilliant light from horizon to horizon, (SSW to NNE)!

It quickly dimmed, but when it first lit up I actually thought it was a atomic weapon of some sort!  That's how bright it was, like the end of the world.

The newswires quickly reported that it was seen from North Carolina to upper NY state, and must have just grazed the upper atmosphere.  It was like a huge fluorescent tube across the entire sky, and if it had just a few degrees different course it would have landed in the south somewhere.

My family growing up was night-owls as my Dad worked nights putting out a morning newspaper, so I've seen more meteors and such than most non-astronomers. We live in the country as well, which make it possible to see comets and meteorites and such, compared to the city lights.  Very interesting rocks indeed! 

What are the odds of self-collecting one of these babies?  I suppose you could metal-detect around known landing sites and increase the odds a little...  Isn't this how that big meteorite full of crystals displayed in Tuscon a couple of years ago was found?  Hi-tech metal detectors in Nebraska or somewhere like that...IIRC.  

I read once about a geology (or maybe astronomy?) professor who asked mining companies to provide him metal junk, removed from the beltways of underground mines by power electromagnets intended to keep metal tools from messing up crushing machinery, in hopes of finding ancient nickle-iron meteorites, does this ring a bell with anyone?

JR in WV




      

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