Night sky phenomenon remains unexplained 30MAR09

Night sky phenomenon remains unexplained (29MAR09)
Richmond Times Dispatch
By Bill Mckelway
Published: March 30, 2009

No one's sure what caused last evening's flashes in the sky. The National Weather Service said today it has seen no evidence of any naturally occurring phenomenon to explain reports of a bright flash of light in eastern Virginia, Maryland and North Carolina.... (More)http://www.timesdispatch.com/rtd/news/local/article/BOOM30_20090329-234409/244022/

Streaking lights, explosions reported Dorchester County, Md., to the Virginia/North Carolina border 29MAR09

By Patrick Wilson
The Virginian-Pilot© March 30, 2009

Were they meteors? A comet? UFOs?
People from Maryland to Hampton Roads heard loud explosions and saw brilliant, streaking lights in the sky Sunday night.
There was no immediate explanation, the National Weather Service office in Wakefield said. The Virginia Beach 911 center had numerous calls waiting just before 10 p.m., a supervisor said.
The Weather Service said reports were made from Dorchester County, Md., to the Virginia/North Carolina border. People said they saw a streak in the sky and heard an explosion.
“It was orange, like a fireball,” said Steve Wagner, who lives in the Great Bridge area of Chesapeake and said what he saw was too close to be a shooting star. Wagner was outside cooking with family when he saw the streak. He said he went inside when his daughter called, then heard an explosion that sounded like thunder.
Chris Wamsley, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service’s Wakefield office, said there could be various causes of the explosions and lights. A team of people is looking into what happened, he said.
Lindsey Hosek of the Great Neck area of Virginia Beach was jogging along the water with her dog when the sky lit up, she said.
“The bright light at first terrified me because I thought somebody was shining a light on me, and then I saw it, and I was in complete awe because it was so beautiful,” she said.
Then she saw something that looked like a comet moving low toward the ground; it was blue in front followed by orange and appeared to be the shape and size of a refrigerator.
“It was just so low. It was like where a bird should be,” she said. “It was definitely heading downward.”
She was on the phone with a friend a minute later when she heard an explosion.
Kenneth Martin of Chesapeake’s South Norfolk neighborhood said he saw what appeared to be lightning, then the sky turned blue.
Then, he said, a white ball of fire shot close to the ground and appeared to burn out. He said he’s sure it was a meteor.
“It was so vivid in the sky, blinking,” he said. “It was the strangest thing I’ve ever seen.”
No damage was reported, the Weather Service said.

Patrick Wilson, (757) 446-2957, patrick.wilson@pilotonline.com

"Stars of Asia" Workshop of Asian Star Legends 30MAR09

An upcoming workshop on Asian myths/legends about stars will be held from 11 to 13 May, 2009 in Mitaka, Tokyo.
http://www-irc.mtk.nao.ac.jp/~webadm/StarsofAsia_E/index.php?workshop
The "Stars of Asia" workshop aims to bring, report and recognize good myths/legends related to the stars and universe from Asian countries/regions. This is an important milestone of the IYA 2009 Asian collaborative project "Stars of Asia".
Our final target is to publish attractive books of Myths and Legends about Stars and the Universe of Asia for children, people, and teachers in Asia and the world. For this purpose, we will nominate one member of the Editorial Board from each country/region during the WS. The first Editorial Board meeting will be held in the afternoon of May 13 (Wed).

The WS will be held in the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan (NAOJ) headquarters campus, Large Seminer Room: 2-21-1, Osawa, Mitaka, Tokyo, Japan 181-8588.
Location: West boundary of Tokyo city, takes about 1 hour from Tokyo Station by train and bus, or 2 hours from Narita International Airport by limousine or trains. You can see the access route here.

Registration 　
Please access the following web page and fill the form.
http://spreadsheets.google.com/viewform?key=pOH0AtAkr9Egd4acSW1OlGA&t=3552819128023078789

After you fill the registration form, please click the last button of the form to send your registration. You are supposed to get an acceptance
e-mail from the workshop secretary within a couple days.

If you don't receive the e-mail, please e-mail to irc@nao.ac.jp.
If you send several registration forms at the same time by mistake, only the latest one will be accepted.
If you have any questions, please send e-mail to irc@nao.ac.jp
Fumi YOSHIDA: Workshop secretary, NAOJ.

Hopper the Meteorite Dog-A Hillsboro collector adds a tale of a meteorite-hunting hound to his stock 29MAR09

A Hillsboro collector adds a tale of a meteorite-hunting hound to his stock
Sunday, March 29, 2009
The Oregonian

On Feb. 15 in Austin, Texas, runners struggled through the streets, midmarathon. A news cameraman covering the race happened to catch a fireball streaking through the sky.
The first news reports said a plane had crashed. A helicopter was dispatched to the site.
But there was no plane.
In Hillsboro, Rob Wesel thought he knew exactly what had happened: A meteoroid had streaked to Earth, scattering fragments -- or meteorites -- over Texas farmland.
(continued): http://www.oregonlive.com/news/oregonian/margie_boule/index.ssf?/base/living/1238027117161870.xml&coll=7

Time to Solidify an Ocean of Magma -Lunar Study 29MAR09

Time to Solidify an Ocean of Magma
25MAR09
--- A small mineral grain places limits on how long it took the lunar magma ocean to solidify.

Written by G. Jeffrey Taylor
Hawai‘i Institute of Geophysics and Planetology
Cosmochemists are reasonably sure that a global ocean of magma surrounded the Moon when it formed. This was a monumentally important event in lunar history, forming the primary feldspar-rich crust of the lunar highlands and setting the stage for subsequent melting inside the Moon to make additional crustal rocks. Numerous questions remain about the complex array of processes that could have operated in such a huge amount of magma, and about how long it took to solidify the magma ocean. Alex Nemchin and colleagues at Curtin University of Technology (Australia), Westfäilische Wilhelms-Universität (Münster, Germany), and the Johnson Space Center (Houston, Texas, USA) dated a half-millimeter grain of the mineral zircon (ZrSiO4) in an impact melt breccia from the Apollo 17 landing site. They used an ion microprobe to measure the concentrations of lead and uranium isotopes in the crystal, finding that one portion of the grain recorded an age of 4.417 ± 0.006 billion years. Because zircon does not crystallize until more than 95% of the magma ocean has crystallized, this age effectively marks the end of magma ocean crystallization. Magma ocean cooling and crystallization began soon after the Moon-forming giant impact. Other isotopic studies show that this monumental event occurred 4.517 billion years ago. Thus, the difference between the two ages means that the magma ocean took 100 million years to solidify.

Reference:

Nemchin, A., Timms, N., Pidgeon, R., Geisler, T., Reddy, S., and Meyer, C. (2009) Timing of Crystallization of the Lunar Magma Ocean Constrained by the Oldest Zircon. Nature Geoscience, 25 January 2009: doi: 10.1038/NGEO417.

MORE with photos: http://www.psrd.hawaii.edu/Mar09/magmaOceanSolidification.html

Meteorite News 27MAR09

Meteorite hunters in town, seek both witnesses and fallen objects
The Augusta Chronicle Fri, 27 Mar 2009 10:32 AM PDT
An Atlanta meteorite hunter was in Augusta on Friday searching for remnants of a meteorite believed to have caused an early morning sonic boom and fireball sighting on March 20.

Meteorite Hunters Closing In On Georgia Fireball, Reward Upped To $20,000
WJBF-TV Augusta Fri, 27 Mar 2009 09:00 AM PDT
According to an e-mail from meteorite hunter David Pitt, meteorite hunters are in the CSRA looking for the supposed meteorite that cause last Friday morningâs loud boom. They believe the meteorite came to rest in the Augusta area.

California Bolide 26MAR09

Bolide over California 26MAR09
Photo by Larry Stange- YCSentinel

Moments ago... as I was observing the Orion Nebula through my SN8/LXD (8") Shmidt-Neutonian, I saw a white flash that lit up the aperature of the scope. Upon looking up toward Orion I saw a persistant trail lasting about 2 seconds and quite long (~7 degrees.). I summoned wife to watch telescope while checking the Sentinel camera to see if it got it too. It did! A SLOW and nice Bolide with a double explosion and apparent fragmentation products clearly evident however small they are. The Fireball was heading toward the Nebula but did not quite reach it from my location 35 miles North of Sacramento.

Event Date & Time: 20090326_2108:54 PDT
Duration: 3 seconds.
Double detonation with an eye visible train a full 3 seconds after
Start Azimuth: 213 Deg., End Azimuth: 233 Deg. True North.
Start Elevation: 47 Deg., End Elevation: 32 Deg.
Second image(scaled) shows where telescope was pointed on M42.
It was only a couple of degrees elevation from the 2nd detonation point. With an 8" F4 telescope at 65X, no eye damage would have occured but only one eye would have been useful for night vision the rest of the night. :-)

Click "fit to screen" or "Double size" when Q-Time movie is playing for better detail.


http://www.geocities.com/stange34@sbcglobal.net/YEAR2.html



click latest event & scroll to bottom.

Larry Stange- YCSentinel

2008 TC3, Almahata Sitta meteorite came from F-class asteroid 26MAR09

http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=asteroid-meteorite-sudan-fireball

Rock Science: First Meteorites Recovered on Earth from an Asteroid Tracked in Space Fragments in the Sudanese desert make up an "asteroid trifecta":
discovery, prediction and recovery By John Matson Scientific American March 25, 2009

Last October, asteroid monitors at the Catalina Sky Survey at the University of Arizona in Tucson picked up a small object on an immediate collision course with Earth. The asteroid was too small to present a real threat - just a few meters across, it stood little chance of penetrating the atmosphere intact. Indeed, it exploded in astratospheric fireball over northern Sudan less than 24 hours later - anevent witnessed by people on the ground as well as the pilots of a KLM airliner- conforming well to astronomer's predictions for its trajectory. But the asteroid, dubbed 2008 TC3, was nonetheless a momentous discovery: Among the countless small objects that strike Earth's atmosphere every year, none had ever been detected and tracked before it impacted. Now the Sudan bolide has yielded yet another first:

Researchers report in Nature today
<http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v458/n7237/full/nature07920.html>that they have recovered 47 meteorites from the object in the Nubian Desert. And lead author Peter Jenniskens, a meteor astronomer at the SETI Institute in Mountain View, Calif., says that another search completed earlier this month, after the paper was submitted, has upped the meteorite count to about 280.
Astronomer Donald Yeomans, manager of NASA's Near-Earth Object Programoffice <http://neo.jpl.nasa.gov/> at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory inPasadena, Calif., calls 2008 TC3 "a perfect asteroid trifecta,"referring to "pre-impact discovery, successful impact prediction, and successful sample return." (Yeomans did not contribute to the recovery research, but his office played a leading role in tracking the asteroid's entry <http://www.cfa.harvard.edu/mpec/K08/K08T50.html>.)

The find allows astronomers to connect the chemical composition of the meteorite to its orbit and reflectance in the sky during tracking. "The holy grail of asteroid science is to uniquely link a specific meteorite and its detailed composition to a specific asteroid type," Yeomans says."And that has now been done without an expensive sample-return mission. "This object, which the study's authors call Almahata Sitta (Arabic for Station Six, a train station in the desert where eyewitnesses saw the fireball and that served as the researchers' base camp), appears to belong to a rare class of bodies called F-class asteroids, which constitute just 1.3 percent of all asteroids. Chemically speaking, Almahata Sitta is a meteorite whose specific composition is unique among meteorite collections. It is a fragile, porous ureilite (a relatively rare kind of olivine- and pyroxene-bearing meteorite)containing graphite and nanodiamonds, among other materials. Its fragility, Jenniskens says, helps explain why it broke apart so high in the atmosphere. With the benefit of the object's rarity as an F-class body and its orbit, tracked backward through time, the researchers established a possible link to a larger F-class asteroid, the 1.6-mile-(2.6-kilometer-) diameter 1998 KU2, which may have originated from the same parent body as Almahata Sitta."The orbit of the asteroid, by just tracking it for 20 hours, is 10,000times better than anything you can get from just observing a fireball Jenniskens says. "What's neat about this is that the big asteroid allows you to extend back in time the evolutionary history." He notes that scientists might be able to pinpoint the specific region of the asteroid belt that 2008 TC3 came from with more F-class asteroids from the same parent body. Even the brief amount of time 2008 TC3 was tracked provided an excellent lead on where to look- and the desert surface provided an ideal surface for turning up the dark fragments. "The entry trajectory was very precisely known," Jenniskens says. The first samples were found in early December by a 45-person search team from the University of Khartoum. (Three scientists from that university and one from the University of Juba in Sudan are among the co-authors of the study.) "We had many eyes and hands," Jenniskens says, trying "to find these."

“Sirente crater”, Italy impact origin disputed 26MAR09

An article in journal of Geophysical Research disputes the origin of the what has been called the “Sirente crater”.The paper discussing this theory is:
Speranza, F., I. Nicolosi, N. Ricchetti, G. Etiope, P. Rochette, L. Sagnotti, R. De Ritis, and M. Chiappini (2009), The “Sirente crater field,” Italy, revisited. Journal of Geophysical Research. vol. 114, B03103, doi:10.1029/2008JB005759
http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2009/2008JB005759.shtml

They concluded:
“Our data show that the Sirente crater and the minor depressions are simply the results of human activity and karstic processes, respectively.”
An article that discusses this paper is:
Bondre, N., 2009, Geomorphology: Crater or not? Nature Geoscience. vol 2, no. 3, p. 166.

TOC at
http://www.nature.com/ngeo/journal/v2/n3/index.html

PDF file at
http://www.tulane.edu/~kmstraub/Publications/Abrams_09/News_and_Views_09.pdf

Source: Paul H.

2008 TC3 classified as a Ureilite 26MAR09

Carnegie Institution of WashingtonWashington, D.C.
Contact:Douglas Rumble, 202-478-8990
March 25, 2009

Asteroid Impact Helps Trace Meteorite Origins

The car-sized asteroid that exploded above the Nubian Desert last October was small compared to the dinosaur-killing, civilization-ending objects that still orbit the sun. But that didn't stop it from having a huge impact among scientists. This was the first instance of an asteroid spotted in space before falling to Earth. Researchers rushed to collect the resulting meteorite debris, and a new paper in Nature reports on this first-ever opportunity to calibrate telescopic observations of a known asteroid with laboratory analyses of its fragments."Any number of meteorites have been observed as fireballs and smoking meteor trails as they come through the atmosphere," says Douglas Rumble of the Carnegie Institution's Geophysical Laboratory, a co-author of the paper."It's been happening for years. But to actually see this object before it gets to the Earth's atmosphere and then to follow it in -- that's the unique thing."The chemical compositions of asteroids can be studied from Earth by analyzing the spectra of sunlight reflected from their surfaces. This provides enough information to divide asteroids into broad categories, butdoes not yield detailed information on their compositions. On the otherhand, meteorites recovered on Earth can be analyzed directly for chemical composition, but researchers generally have no direct information on what type of asteroid they came from.The asteroid, known as 2008 TC3, was first sighted October 6, 2008, by telescopes of the automated Catalina Sky Survey near Tucson Arizona. Numerous observatories followed its trajectory and took spectrographic measurements before it disappeared into the Earth's shadow the following day. A recovery team led by Peter Jenniskens of the SETI Institute in California and Muawia Shaddad of the University of Khartoum then searched for meteorites along the projected approach path in northern Sudan. They recovered 47 fragments, one of which was selected for preliminary analysisby laboratories, including the Carnegie Institution's Geophysical Laboratory."This asteroid was made of a particularly fragile material that caused it to explode at a high 37 kilometer altitude, before it was significantly slowed down, so that the few surviving fragments scattered over a large area,"explains Jenniskens, the lead author of the Nature paper. "The recovered meteorites were unlike anything in our meteorite collections up to that point."Carnegie's Andrew Steele studied the meteorite's carbon content, which showed signs that at some point in its past the meteorite had been subjected to very high temperatures. "Without a doubt, of all the meteorites that we've ever studied, the carbon in this one has been cooked to the greatest extent," says Steele. "Very cooked, graphite-like carbon is the main constituent of the carbon in this meteorite." Another form of carbon Steele found in the meteorite, nanodiamonds, may give clues as to whether the heating was caused by impacts on the parent asteroid, or by some other process. Oxygen isotopes in the meteorite give other information about its parent body. Each source of meteorites in the solar system, including planets such as Mars, has a distinctive signature of the three isotopes 16O, 17O, and18O. This signature can be recognized even when other variables, such as chemical composition or rock type, differ. "Oxygen isotopes represent the single most decisive measurement in determining the parental or family groupings of meteorites," says Rumble who performed the analysis. According to Rumble's analysis, 2008 TC3 falls into a category of very rare meteorites called ureilites, all of which may have originally come from the same parent body. "Where that is, we don't know," says Rumble. But because astronomers took spectral measurements of 2008 TC3 before it hit the Earth,and can compare those measurements with the laboratory analyses, scientists will be better able to recognize ureilite asteroids in space. One known asteroid with a similar spectrum, the 2.6 kilometer-sized asteroid 1998 KU2, has already been identified by researchers as a possible source for 2008 TC3. Rumble's work was funded by NASA Cosmochemistry grant NNX07AI48G. Steele was supported by NASA's Sample Return Laboratory Instruments and Data Analysis Program (SRLIDAP) , NASA's Astrobiology Science and Technology for Exploring Planets (ASTEP) program , and the NASA Astrobiology Institute (NAI).

IMAGE CAPTION:[http://www.ciw.edu/sites/www.ciw.edu/files/news/PRRumbleSteeleAsteroid-ImageAMedforWeb.jpg(31KB)]

This fragment of Asteroid 2008 TC3 provided scientists with the first-ever opportunity to calibrate telescopic observations of a known asteroid with laboratory analyses.

2008 TC3 Asteroid monitored from outer space to ground 26MAR09

Public Affairs

Sandia National Laboratories

Media contact: Neal Singer, (505) 845-7078

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: March 25, 2009

We saw it coming:

Asteroid monitored from outer space to ground impact

Sandians Mark Boslough and Dick Spalding watch it in real time

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. -- Reports by scientists of meteorites striking Earth in the past have resembled police reports of so many muggings -- the offenders came out of nowhere and then disappeared into the crowd, making it difficultto get more than very basic facts.Now an international research team has been able to identify an asteroid inspace before it entered Earth's atmosphere, enabling computers to determineits area of origin in the solar system as well as predict the arrival timeand location on Earth of its shattered surviving parts."I would say that this work demonstrates, for the first time, the ability ofastronomers to discover and predict the impact of a space object," saysSandia National Laboratories researcher Mark Boslough, a member of theresearch team.Perhaps more importantly, the event tested the ability of society to respond very quickly to a predicted impact, says Boslough. "In this case, it was never a threat, so the response was scientific. Had it been deemed a threat-- a larger asteroid that would explode over a populated area -- an alert could have been issued in time that could potentially save lives by evacuating the danger zone or instructing people to take cover. "The profusion of information in this case also helps meteoriticists learn the orbits of parent bodies that yield various types of meteorites.Such knowledge could help future space missions explore or even mine the asteroids in Earth-crossing orbits, Boslough says.The four-meter-diameter asteroid, called 2008 TC3, was initially sighted by the automated Catalina Sky Survey telescope at Mount Lemmon, Ariz., on Oct.6. Numerous observatories, alerted to the invader, then imaged the object. Computations correctly predicted impact would occur 19 hours after discovery in the Nubian Desert of northern Sudan. According to NASA's Near Earth Object program, "A spectacular fireball litup the predawn sky above Northern Sudan on October 7, 2008."A wide variety of analyses were performed while the asteroid was en route and after its surviving pieces were located by meteorite hunters in an intense search.

Researchers, listed in the paper describing this work in the March 26 issueof the journal Nature, range from the SETI Institute, the University of Khartoum, Juba University (Sudan), Sandia, Caltech, NASA Johnson Space Center and NASA Ames, to other universities in the U.S., Canada, Ireland,England, Czech Republic and the Netherlands. Sandia researcher Dick Spalding interpreted recorded data about the atmospheric fireball, and Boslough estimated the aerodynamic pressure and strength of the asteroid based on the estimated burst altitude of 36 kilometers. Searchers have recovered 47 meteorites so far -- offshoots from the disintegrating asteroid, mostly immolated by its encounter with atmospheric friction -- with a total mass of 3.95 kilograms.The analyzed material showed carbon-rich materials not yet represented in meteorite collections, indicating that fragile materials still unknown may account for some asteroid classes. Such meteorites are less likely to survive due to destruction upon entry and weathering once they land on Earth's surface."Chunks of iron and hard rock last longer and are easier to find than clumps of soft carbonaceous materials," says Boslough."We knew that locating an incoming object while still in space could be done, but it had never actually been demonstrated until now," says Boslough."In this post-rational age where scientific explanations and computer models are often derided as 'only theories,' it is nice to have a demonstration like this."Sandia is a multiprogram laboratory operated by Sandia Corporation, a Lockheed Martin company, for the U.S. Department of Energy's National Nuclear Security Administration. With main facilities in Albuquerque, N.M.,and Livermore, Calif., Sandia has major R&D responsibilities in national security, energy and environmental technologies, and economic competitiveness.

IMAGE CAPTIONS:[Image 1:

http://www.sandia.gov/news/resources/releases/2009/images/asteroid_boslough.jpg(4.7MB)]

Don't look back -- it may be gaining on you: Sandia's Mark Boslough discusses aspects of asteroids (Photo by Randy Montoya)

[Image 2:

http://www.sandia.gov/news/resources/releases/2009/images/asteroid_spalding.jpg(1.5MB)]

Dick Spalding examines the night sky (Photo by Randy Montoya)

Meteorite News 26MAR09

Scientists Catch Shooting Star For First Time
CBS 2 Los Angeles Thu, 26 Mar 2009 12:16 PM PDT
For the first time scientists matched a meteorite found on Earth with a specific asteroid that became a fireball plunging through the sky. It gives them a glimpse into the past when planets formed and an idea how to avoid a future asteroid Armageddon.

Astronomers catch a shooting star
The Times of India Thu, 26 Mar 2009 11:47 AM PDT
WASHINGTON: For the first time, US scientists matched a meteorite found on Earth with a specific asteroid that became a fireball plunging through the sky. It gives them a glimpse into the past when planets formed and an idea how to avoid a future asteroid Armageddon.

How Did They Catch a Shooting Star?
ABC News Thu, 26 Mar 2009 09:21 AM PDT
Astronomers matched a shooting star with a meteorite found on Earth.

Meteorite matches with asteroid
News 24 South Africa Thu, 26 Mar 2009 09:18 AM PDT
For the first time US scientists have matched a meteorite found on Earth with a specific asteroid that became a fireball plunging through the sky.

Scientists Track Down Fallen Star Treasure
TechNewsWorld.com Thu, 26 Mar 2009 09:12 AM PDT
For the first time, scientists matched a meteorite found on Earth with a specific asteroid that became a fireball plunging through the sky. It gives them a glimpse into the past when planets formed and an idea how to avoid a future asteroid Armageddon. Last October, astronomers tracked a small nonthreatening asteroid heading toward Earth before it became a "shooting star."

Jesus Christ's face appears on broken meteorite
Pravda Ru Thu, 26 Mar 2009 06:14 AM PDT
Russian scientists noticed the image of Jesus Christ on the meteorite which fell down on the Earth about 100 years ago. The image is identical to the one that appears on the Shroud of Turin.

Meteorite found in Sudan
The Sarasota Herald-Tribune Thu, 26 Mar 2009 04:17 AM PDT
For the first time, scientists have matched a meteorite found on Earth with a specific asteroid that became a fireball plunging through the sky. It gives them a glimpse into the past when planets formed.

Scientists trace meteorite origins
Spacetoday.net Thu, 26 Mar 2009 02:36 AM PDT
Planetary scientists have for the first time linked an asteroid observed before it entered the...

Asteroid's past can help plan future
Seattle Times Thu, 26 Mar 2009 02:13 AM PDT
For the first time scientists matched a meteorite found on Earth with a specific asteroid that became a fireball plunging through the sky...

Younger Dryas about 12,900 BP PBS Program to Air

PBS Program to Feature Two UMaine Scientists, March 23, 2009
http://www.umaine.edu/news/view_release.php?x=1237809989

Dr. Kennett gave a talk, which included a lot of research that is either being prepared for publication, been submitted for publication, and in press. Dr. Kennett made a very convincing case that something unique, extraordinary, and instantaneous occurred at the beginning of the Younger Dryas about 12,900 B. calender years ago and could be an event that was extraterrestrial in nature. His idea that it involved multiple, simultaneous Tunguska-like events occurring across the North American continent. He also, discussed and showed pictures of the research on the Greenland ice sheet, carried out by Paul Mayewski, and Andrei Kurbatov. Outcropping along the edge of the Greenland Ice Sheetis a well defined Younger Dryas bed, which consists of dark greydusty ice with clean, white Holocene ice above it and clean, white terminal Pleistocene ice below it. They found the nannodiamonds and other alleged impact indicators right at and only at the basal contact of the Younger Dryas ice layer. They found exactly what would be expected for an layer of meteoritic debris from Tunguska-like events.

This is a show that you do not want to miss.It is in the realm of possibility, that decade or so from now, Dr. West, Dr. Kennett, and other members the YDB Group will likely be known as the "Walter Alvarezes of the Quaternary.

I am now getting together with a couple of archaeologists to do some “prospecting” for nannodiamonds and microspherules.

Some relevant publications:

Haynes, V. C., Jr., 2008, Younger Dryas “black mats” and the Rancholabrean termination in North America. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. vol. 105 no. 18 6520-6525
http://www.pnas.org/content/105/18/6520.abstract

Did a Significant Cool Spell Mark the Demise of Megafauna?http://uanews.org/node/19409
Kennett, J.D., J.P. Kennett, G.J. West, J.M. Erlandson, J.R. Johnson, I.L. Hendy, A. West, B.J. Culleton, T.L. Jones and Thomas W. Stafford Jr., 2008, Quaternary Science Reviews.vol. 27, no. 27-28, pp. 2530-2545.

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.quascirev.2008.09.006
Kennett, D.J., J. P. Kennett, A. West, C. Mercer, S. S. Que Hee, and L. Bement, 2009, Nanodiamonds in the Younger Dryas Boundary Sediment Layer. Science. vol. 323, no. 5910, p. 94.

http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/323/5910/94

Written by Paul H

Meteorite News 25MAR09

Astronomers catch a shooting star for 1st time
GMA News Wed, 25 Mar 2009 17:09 PM PDT
WASHINGTON - For the first time scientists matched a meteorite found on Earth with a specific asteroid that became a fireball plunging through the sky. It gives them a glimpse into the past when planets formed and an idea how to avoid a future asteroid Armageddon.

Asteroid impact helps trace meteorite origins
SpaceRef Wed, 25 Mar 2009 16:25 PM PDT
Asteroid impact helps trace meteorite origins

Astronomers catch a shooting star for first time
Boston Herald Wed, 25 Mar 2009 15:21 PM PDT
WASHINGTON - For the first time scientists matched a meteorite found on Earth with a specific asteroid that became a fireball plunging through the sky. It gives them a glimpse...

Meteorite hunters 'strike gold' in Sudan
New Scientist Wed, 25 Mar 2009 12:51 PM PDT
Meteor expert Peter Jenniskens describes what it was like to scour the Nubian Desert for fragments of the first space rock ever observed before it hit Earth

Asteroid tracked from space to Earth for 1st time
CBC Wed, 25 Mar 2009 12:35 PM PDT
Scientists for the first time have recovered meteorite pieces from an asteroid first observed in space - a stroke of luck that could prove valuable when tracking space rocks heading on a collision course toward Earth.

Shooting Star Hunt Yields Meteorite
Discovery Channel Wed, 25 Mar 2009 11:56 AM PDT
Scientists find a meteorite linked to a recently tracked asteroid's plunge to Earth.

Space 'Rosetta Stone' Unlike Anything Seen Before
SPACE.com Wed, 25 Mar 2009 11:25 AM PDT
Meteorite fragments of asteroid that exploded over Sudan found, analyzed.

Asteroid impact helps trace meteorite origins
EurekAlert! Wed, 25 Mar 2009 11:25 AM PDT( Carnegie Institution )
The car-sized asteroid that exploded above the Nubian Desert last October was the first instance of an asteroid spotted in space before falling to Earth. Researchers rushed to collect the resulting meteorite debris, and a new paper in Nature reports on this first-ever opportunity to calibrate telescopic observations of a known asteroid with laboratory analyses of its ...

Space 'Rosetta Stone' Unlike Anything Seen Before
SPACE.com via Yahoo! News Wed, 25 Mar 2009 11:20 AM PDT
Meteorite fragments of the first asteroid ever spotted in space before it slammed into Earth's atmosphere last year were recovered by scientists from the deserts of Sudan.

Meteorite News 25MAR09

Meteorite returns to Arizona
UPI Tue, 24 Mar 2009 17:03 PM PDT
FLAGSTAFF, Ariz., March 24 (UPI) -- A meteorite that was stolen from an Arizona museum decades ago has been returned to the Meteor Crater east of Flagstaff, Ariz., officials said.

Students receive NASA training
The Southside Reporter Tue, 24 Mar 2009 13:48 PM PDT
Teachers and staff members at Neil Armstrong Elementary School took part in a live video conference with NASA officials at the Johnson Space Center in Houston to become authorized borrowers of lunar and meteorite samples.

A man purchased the basket-shaped rock at a yard sale three years ago for $10.
ABC 15 Phoenix Tue, 24 Mar 2009 13:31 PM PDT
It was stolen in 1968, now it is back where it belongs. A Wisconsin resident has returned the "Basket" meteorite to Arizona. The rock began as part of the Canyon Diablo Meteor, which flew 40,000 miles-an-hour.

WI Man Returns Meteorite to Arizona
WEAU Eau Claire Tue, 24 Mar 2009 12:56 PM PDT
A meteorite that crashed into Arizona 50,000 years ago has been missing for 40 years, until now.

Wisconsin man returns meteorite to Arizona
WSAW Wausau Tue, 24 Mar 2009 11:07 AM PDT
A meteorite that crashed into Arizona 50,000 years ago has been missing for 40 years -- until now. A retired General Motors worker from Wisconsin is the reason the 49-pound meteorite has been returned to Meteor Crater in Flagstaff.

Meteorite returns home to Ariz.
FOX 11 Tucson Tue, 24 Mar 2009 10:00 AM PDT
PHOENIX (AP) -- A meteorite that crashed into Arizona 50,000 years ago, but has been missing for 40 years, is back home. The "Basket" meteorite was stolen from Meteor Crater east of Flagstaff in August 1968.
Long-lost meteorite comes home to Ariz.
The Arizona Republic Tue, 24 Mar 2009 08:05 AM PDT
In August 1968, an odd-shaped meteorite was stolen from Arizona's Meteor Crater. On Monday, the meteorite found its way home.

Man Returns Meteorite He Got For $10 At Yard Sale
WCCO Minneapolis - St. Paul Tue, 24 Mar 2009 07:40 AM PDT
A meteorite that crashed into Arizona 50,000 years ago, but has been missing for 40 years, is back home.

Gift to Chicago's Field Museum establishes world's largest non-government meteorite collection
EurekAlert! Tue, 24 Mar 2009 07:17 AM PDT( Field Museum )
The Field Museum in Chicago has become home to the world's largest collection of meteorites held outside a government agency, the result of a gift of funding and meteorites worth more than $10 million.

Meteorite lands back home
Arizona Daily Sun Tue, 24 Mar 2009 05:38 AM PDTFor the last few years Tom Lynch has been using a 50-pound rock as a counter weight for his grandson's basketball hoop.

NASA-- Sudan Meteorite Recovery Teleconference to be held 25MAR09

MEDIA ADVISORY : M09-044

NASA Sets Teleconference To Discuss Recovered Meteorites

WASHINGTON -- NASA will hold a media teleconference on Wednesday, March 25, at 2 p.m. EDT (1800 UT) to reveal science findings from recently discovered meteorites.

The meteorites originate from a small asteroid that entered Earth's atmosphere over the Nubian Desert of northern Sudan on Oct. 7, 2008. The discovery presents scientists with an unprecedented opportunity to understand these nomads of the solar system better.

The briefing participants are:

- Peter Jenniskens, meteor astronomer at NASA's Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, Calif., and the SETI Institute in Mountain View, Calif.

- Steve Chesley, scientist in NASA's Near-Earth Object Program Office at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif.

- Michael Zolensky, cosmic mineralogist at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston

- Lucy McFadden, professor of astronomy at the University of Maryland in College Park

Reporters who would like to participate in the call should submit requests for dial-in instructions to Steve Cole at stephen.e.cole@nasa.gov.

A replay of the teleconference will be available until May 1 by dialing 888-403-4660.

Supporting visuals will be available online at the start of the event at: http://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/tc3

Audio of the teleconference will be streamed live on NASA's Web site at: http://www.nasa.gov/newsaudio

Impact Geology Drilling Project in Siberia update 23MAR09

Seeking Earth`s Past by Drilling in Remote Arctic
Kansas City InfoZine Mon, 23
Mar 2009 03:01 AM PDT

In mid-March, drilling by paleoclimatologists to retrieve sediment and meteorite-impact rocks from remotest Siberia reached about 213 feet (65 m), about 1 million years into the past. They hope to retrieve the longest continuous climate data ever collected for the Arctic, over 3.6 million years.

Meteorite News 20MAR-21MAR09

Big Bucks For Person With Meteorite Remains
WJBF-TV Augusta Sat, 21 Mar 2009 14:45 PM PDT
Up to $10,000 for the first kilo of meteorite.

'Dino Man' thrills Eliot Elementary students
Portsmouth Herald Sat, 21 Mar 2009 03:08 AM PDT
ELIOT, Maine and#8212;
Eighteen energetic first-graders in Andrea Rohde's class sat wide-eyed on the Eliot Elementary School gym floor listening to "Dinoman" and touching 65-million-year-old dinosaur-age relics: horns, claws, teeth, a meteorite, ancient...

Group to hunt meteor pieces
The Augusta Chronicle Sat, 21 Mar 2009 01:39 AM PDT
AIKEN --- A group of Western meteorite hunters is headed to Augusta, chasing the possibility a meteor hit somewhere in the region early Friday, bringing reports of a loud boom and a fireball in the sky.

Meteorite from Aquilla area sells for $10,000
Austin American-Statesman Fri, 20 Mar 2009 18:11 PM PDT
Mike Farmer spent about a month searching for pieces of the meteor that blazed a trail through the Central Texas skies and broke apart over southern Hill County and northern McLennan County last month.

Clues To A Secret Of Life Discovered By NASA Scientists 19MAR09

Clues To A Secret Of Life Discovered By NASA Scientists
Medical News Today
Thu, 19 Mar 2009 03:23 AM PDT
NASA scientists analyzing the dust of meteorites have discovered new clues to a long-standing mystery about how life works on its most basic, molecular level. "We found more support for the idea that biological molecules, like amino acids, created in space and brought to Earth by meteorite impacts help explain why life is left-handed," said Dr.

large rock mysteriously falls from the sky in Zimbabwes’ Nkayi village 19MAR09

A large rock mysteriously falls from the sky in Zimbabwes’ Nkayi village
http://www.zimdiaspora.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=894:a-large-rock-mysteriously-falls-from-the-sky-in-zimbabwes-nkayi-village&catid=38:travel-tips&Itemid=274
Thursday, 19 March 2009 15:02
administrator News By Owen Gagare

A LARGE rock, weighing about 100 kilogrammes fell from the “sky,” in Nkayi at the beginning of the month, shocking villagers while at the same time sending the whole district wild with excitement and speculation. The District Administrator for Nkayi, Ms Nosizi Dube, and the Police Officer Commanding Crime in the district, Superintendent Chanetsa Maswi, confirmed the incident.The stone, many villagers now believe. is a gift from God, fell with a thunderous noise in Madlilika Village in the Mjena area of Lukampa under Chief Sikhobokhobo at about 5pm on 1 March.It fell five metres from two villagers, Mr Judia Sibanda and Mr Mncedisi Ngwenya, who were herding cattle in the bush.In interviews on Tuesday, villagers from the area said they heard a thunderous sound coming from the “sky,” and another sound resembling a bomb exploding. “The noise later fizzled into a sound similar to one made by an aircaft on take-off before dying away,” said Mrs Nomsa Ngwenya, a villager. On seeing the rock fall, Mr Sibanda and Mr Ngwenya rushed to their home where they told their father, Mr Spempokuhle Ngwenya, of the incident. Mr Ngwenya told other villagers and together they went to inspect the rock, after which it was agreed that he keeps it since his children had found it.People from the area believe the rock could have been a special gift from God containing very precious minerals while others believe that it could have been sent by their ancestors in a bid to communicate something to them.

They have since vowed to jealously guard it until they get a satisfactory explanation on what it symbolises or what mineral it contains. They have been so determined to keep the rock that they even turned down Chief Sikhobokhobo’s request to have the rock.To date they have only allowed about 15 kilogrammes of the rock to be taken by the Government, through the District Administrator’s Office and security agents, so that it may go for testing. The villagers, however, reluctantly released the rock.

According to Mr Sethukile Ndlovu, a teacher at Mjena Primary School, who also comes from the area, the villagers believe that the unique stone could turn out to be something of great significance.“There is a lot of speculation at the moment but one thing for sure is that no one seems to think it is a bad omen, although people were initially shocked by the incident. A number of people touched the stone and nothing has happened to them but the strongest belief seems to be that it is a precious stone,” he said.“There is belief that it could be containing a very rich mineral while others believe that either God or their ancestors were trying to communicate with them. So, whichever way you look at it, this rock is important to the people of this area and they are keen to find out what it really is. “There is belief that the rock could be a good omen for the area and if there are any benefits from it, the people do not want to lose out.”

Mr Ndlovu said the unique sound, which accompanied the rock made some people believe that there was something supernatural about it.He says the rock was heard in the entire Lukampa area as well as Matshena, Mbuma and Nkalathi areas.

According to Mr Memukeli Khumalo, also from Mjena, Chief Sikhobokhobo sent two of his advisors to have a look at the stone. The chief also requested that the stone be sent to him but the villagers refused. “At that meeting people said they had never seen anything like that. The people refused to let go of the rock because they felt that if it was of significance, then its significance would be here. At that meeting, there was talk of raising spirit mediums so that they could find out what the stone meant but we failed to raise them during the meeting,” he said.When Chief Sikhobokhobo confirmed the incident he alerted the DA who in turn alerted security agents. The Assistant DA, Mr Knowledge Chikanga, then travelled to the area with the police last week.“We wanted to see what it was for ourselves and from a security point of view, establish whether it was of harm or not. The elders from the area held onto the rock but in the end they gave us one piece. We hope to conduct tests on the rock,” said Ms Dube, the DA.The rock weighing 15kg is being kept at Nkayi Police Station.Supt Maswi said the rock would be tested by officials from the Ministry of Mines and Mining Development to establish its chemical composition.The rock is black and very smooth outside. It is grey inside.

Contacted for comment, officials from the Geological Survey Department said they could not explain the phenomenon since they did not have a geologist in the Matabeleland region although another official said the stone could have come from space. A solid state physicist contacted last night said the object could be a meteorite that dropped into the earth from outer space.“I would say maybe a small meteorite. If it is a stone then it could be a meteorite that dropped from outer space,” said the physicist after the object was described to him.A meteorite is a portion of a meteoroid, which is a solid object in interplanetary space, that survives its passage through the atmosphere and impact with the ground without being destroyed.

According to the online encyclopaedia, www.wikipedia.com, numerous people have over the years reported sounds being heard while bright meteors flared overhead. While some scientists have dismissed the idea of sounds accompanying meteors, given the relatively slow speed of sound, sound recordings made under controlled conditions in Mongolia in 1998 by a team led by Slaven Garaj, a physicist at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology at Lausanne, support the contention that the sounds are real.