Submit a Picture

Where is My Picture?!

The Queue

Met Name

Met Type

Thin Sections

352 grams.   Mesosiderite A-1

TKW: 3.83 metric tons. Observed fall: no. Found 1861 in Antofagasta, Chile


Herbert writes:

The Vaca Muerta meteorite was first discovered by prospectors in the Atacama desert, Chile, in 1861. First believed to be silver ore, the location of the meteorite find was later forgotten, after the silvery specks in the stone turned out to be iron rather than silver. More than a century later, in 1985, the mining student Edmundo Martinez rediscovered the meteorite find site after intensive studies of the old accounts. In total, about 4 tons of mesosiderites have been recovered from the strewnfield, which measures about 11x2 km.

The specimen shown here is a 352g fragment with a cut and polished face, taken from the 300 kg mass recovered by Martinez in 1985. The green adhesion is Morenosite, a nickel sulfate mineral that formed as a weathering product from terrestrial sulfates and extraterrestrial nickel in the 3500 years since this meteorite fell.