Australian authorities meteorite likely damaged reservoir
Date: December 10, 1999 Publication: Associated Press Archive An object that crashed into an Australian reservoir was most likely a meteorite the size of a golf ball, authorities said Friday. After signs that something had fallen into a reservoir, officials shut off the water supply to the nearby town of 235 miles north of Sydney. Police set up barricades and scientists carrying Geiger-counters were called in to investigate. The mystery made national news reports Thursday and triggered calls to radio talk shows from people offering... Click here for complete article ($1.50)
Water droplets in meteorite may date to beginning of solar system
Date: September 8, 1999 Publication: Associated Press Archive
Tiny water droplets found in a meteorite may date to the beginning of the universe, a NASA researcher said. Droplets about one-tenth the width of a human hair were discovered in the so-called Zag meteorite, a 300-pound rock that broke into pieces when it struck a remote area of Morocco. The droplets could be billions of years old. Michael Zolensky, the space agency researcher who found water in both the Zag and another meteorite that fell in West Texas last year, said the discoveries... Click here for complete article ($1.50)
Tiny water droplets may date to beginning of solar system
Date: September 7, 1999 Publication: Associated Press Archive Tiny water droplets that could be billions of years old were found in a meteorite, the second found with water, a NASA researcher said. Droplets about one-tenth the width of a human hair were found in the so-called Zag meteorite, a 300-pound rock that broke into pieces when it struck a remote area of Morocco. The water may date to the beginnings of the universe. Michael Zolensky, the space agency researcher who found water in both the Zag and another meteorite that fell in West... Click here for complete article ($1.50)
Water found in meteorite offers chance for discovery
Date: August 27, 1999 Publication: Associated Press Archive
Scientists who cracked open a meteorite that fell to earth last year found tiny pockets of briny water, providing the first close look at water not originating on earth, according to an article in the journal Science. While astronomers have long thought that water flowed through asteroids and other bodies formed at the beginning of the solar system, the meteorite's liquid cargo offered the first chance to actually study it in a lab. "The existence of a... Click here for complete article ($1.50)
Water found in meteorite offers chance for discovery
Date: August 27, 1999 Publication: Associated Press Archive
A rock that fell from the sky to land in a West Texas yard contained a remarkable surprise -- water from the far reaches of space. The researchers who opened the meteorite discovered tiny pockets of briny water, providing the first close look at water not originating on earth, according to an article in the journal Science. "The existence of a water-soluble salt in this meteorite is astonishing," wrote R. N. Clayton of the University of Chicago, who was not... Click here for complete article ($1.50)
Scientists look for more water from space
Author: DAVID HO Associated Press Writer
Date: August 27, 1999 Publication: Associated Press Archive
Having found water in a 4.5 billion-year-old meteorite, NASA scientists are searching for more that may have been overlooked in other space rocks.
The water, locked in a purple crystalline mineral called halite -- or rock salt -- remained uncontaminated by the Earth's atmosphere because scientists studied the meteorite quickly, less than 46 hours after it fell, said Everett Gibson, the NASA scientist who retrieved the space rock last year from the West Texas town of...
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Study: Direct evidence of early oxygen-producing organisms
Author: MATTHEW FORDAHL AP Science Writer
Date: August 5, 1999 Publication: Associated Press Archive
The earliest direct evidence of organisms pumping oxygen into Earth's atmosphere has been found in the ancient remains of bacterial slime that turned up in Australia, researchers reported today.
The 2 1/2 billion-year-old molecular fossils show that early forms of life began paving the evolutionary path for oxygen-breathing animals at least 700 million years earlier than previously known. "Life wouldn't be what it is today if we didn't...
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Scientists find direct evidence of early oxygen-producing organisms
Author: MATTHEW FORDAHL AP Science Writer Date: August 4, 1999 Publication: Associated Press Archive
The earliest direct evidence of organisms pumping oxygen into Earth's ancient atmosphere has been found in the fossilized remnants of bacterial slime, according to research that also gives scientists a new tool in the hunt for life on Mars.
The 2 1/2 billion-year-old molecular fossils from Australia show that early forms of life began paving the evolutionary path for oxygen-breathing animals at least 700 million years earlier than previously known, researchers said in...
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Most of space rock that dug Arizona crater melted on impact, study shows
Author: PAUL RECER AP Science Writer
Date: July 1, 1999 Publication: Associated Press Archive
Most of the space boulder that smashed to Earth to create Meteor Crater in Arizona melted upon impact 50,000 years ago and sprayed molten material in every direction.
A study appearing Friday in the journal Science concludes that an iron meteor 100 feet in diameter and weighing about 60,000 tons sailed in from space at almost 45,000 miles an hour and smashed into the desert floor near Winslow, Ariz. The collision erupted with the force of a 20 megaton bomb and sprayed molten rock for...
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Curiosities abound in Smithsonian's backrooms
Author: JOSEPH SCHUMAN Associated Press Writer
Date: April 26, 1999 Publication: Associated Press Archive
Nearly everyone's attic has them: heirlooms considered priceless or historical or junk, items that don't quite fit in the living room but stuff you just can't bear to throw away.
But with cast-offs like the Bee Gees' silver lame suits, Abraham Lincoln's stovepipe hat and several thousand meteorites, the Smithsonian Institution -- with more than 141 million items and just a fraction of the space to display them -- has the rest...
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NASA team: Evidence of fossilized bacteria found in Mars meteorites
Date: March 19, 1999 Publication: Associated Press Archive
A pair of Martian meteorites include features that resemble Earth bacteria, according to the same NASA researchers who three years claimed they had evidence of "primitive life on early Mars."
The findings, made within the past six months, were from samples of a 1.3 billion-year-old meteorite that fell to Earth in 1911 near Nakhla, Egypt and a 165 million-year-old meteorite that fell near Shergotty, India in 1865. "My own opinion is that these will...
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NASA team: Evidence of fossilized bacteria found in two other meteorites Date: March 19, 1999 Publication: Associated Press Archive
The same NASA team that says it found microbial life in a Martian meteor now claim two other meteors contain similar fossilized remnants.
What appear to be bacteria are contained in two meteorites believed to be from Mars, according to a team led by Johnson Space Center geologist David S. McKay, who presented his findings Thursday at the Lunar and Planetary Science Conference. The NASA team's latest findings, made within the past six months, were from samples of a 1.3...
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Bright light flashing across sky reported in two states
Date: February 2, 1999 Publication: Associated Press Archive
A small meteor streaked across the Western sky this morning, startling people from San Francisco to Las Vegas, more than 400 miles away.
"It was bright and blue and really fantastic," one caller told San Francisco radio station KCBS. Radio stations in several other cities, including Santa Barbara and San Bernardino in Southern California, also had people calling in about the mysterious light.
People reported seeing it for about five seconds, at about 6...
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Bright light flashing across sky reported in two states
Date: February 2, 1999 Publication: Associated Press Archive
A meteor that may have been as big as a Volkswagen streaked across the Western sky Tuesday morning, startling people from Las Vegas to San Francisco.
The mysterious light was described by one caller to a San Francisco radio station as "bright and blue and really fantastic." It was seen for about five seconds around 6 a.m. "You'll see a few of these bright ones in your lifetime," said Jay Goguin, an astronomer at the NASA...
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