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News briefs
Meteor news: Meteorite buyers should take note of a June 8th theft reported by England's Cambridge Evening News today. It is a “dark-coloured” iron meteorite from Australia that “measures around 8cm by 2cm [and] looks like a very badly burnt sausage” (a different meteorite is pictured).
Following Saturday morning's Auckland fall, there is another questionable New Zealand meteorite claim (there have been at least three so far, see news thread). It is reported as found on a Hawke’s Bay beach five years ago. Wairarapa News has a picture today of the rock. The owner says it was sent to Victoria University but “a letter from the university said it could not be ascertained whether the object was a meteorite or not.”
Marco Langbroek comments that his “first hunch is markasite, a ferrosulfide in the pyrite family, that forms this kind of warted semi-round nodules. It also tallies with the ‘rusty’ description, as, uncleaned, it can indeed look quite rusty.”
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About one of the other post-Auckland meteorite claims — “a heavy, hollow object” found while digging for an outhouse, the New Zealand Herald reports tomorrow that the auctioneer has received an expert determination that it is not a meteorite.
Big NEO: MPEC 2004-M02 today announces the third large NEO discovered in two months, which follows a two-year dry spell in finding objects of this size. Based on an initial calculation of absolute magnitude at H=15.3, 2004 LA12 is estimated by standard formula to be on the order of three kilometers wide (2.95 km. = 1.83 miles). It has an odd orbit (e=0.7176, i=41.6°, q = 0.5693 AU), but is not classified by the Minor Planet Center as potentially hazardous. It was discovered Monday morning with NEAT's Mt. Palomar telescope and confirmed by four other observatories yesterday and this morning. The other big NEO recent discoveries are 2004 JN13 and PHO 2004 LJ1 (see news threads ending at May 18th, “Big NEO,” and June 14th, “Cover”).
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