Lot 806
Meteor From Biggest Meteor Strike Since 1907. At 9:20 A.M. on the morning of February 15, 2013 a large 8-10 ton 50 foot long meteor exploded 10-15 miles above the ancient city of Chelyabinsk, Russia with the force of over 500,000 tons of TNT 10 times the force of the atomic bomb that destroyed Hiroshima in 1945. More than 1,500 people were injured from flying glass and debris from the resulting shock wave. This was the largest meteor event in the last 100 years since a large meteor exploded over a remote area of Siberia in 1907. The official name of this meteorite is Chelyabinsk where most of the injuries occurred but most of the meteorite specimens were found on the frozen surface of Chebarkul Lake which is a frozen fresh water lake that is located directly in the meteorite strewnfield about 50 miles west of the city of Chelyabinsk. Because of the immense explosion and ablation through Earth's atmosphere, most of the meteor was either burned up or blasted into a fine powder. More than 95% of the recovered meteorites are extremely small, less than 3 grams in weight.
This beautiful fresh 40 x 18 x 10 mm complete stony meteorite designated as a LL5 SR4 weighs 14.1 grams LL5 SR4 means that it has a low iron content of about 10% which is low even for a stony meteorite. This meteorite fragment is very interesting in that it has two different fusion crusts. The top has a thick dark brown fusion crust that formed high in the earth's atmosphere when the meteorite first broke up and the bottom side has a much thinner black fusion crust that started to form after the final tremendous explosion and did not have enough time to become thick. The small sections that are not covered by fusion crust offera window inside of the meteorite displaying its light gray matrix mixed with specks of iron and beige dn brown chondrules It is not possible to obtain a fresher meteorite and it is very valuable for study in that there has been no contamination with Earth rocks and erosion. Housed in a 8 X 6" Riker mount with a photo of the explosion. Estimated Value $500 - 700
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