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Iron meteorites
Campo del Cielo
Origin: Campo del
Cielo, Gran Chaco Gualamba, Argentina
Structural Class: Coarse
octahedrite, Og, Widmanstatten bandwidth 3.0 ±0.6 mm.
Chemical Class: Group I, 6.68% Ni, 0.43% Co, 0.25% P, 87 ppm Ga, 407
ppm Ge, 3.6 ppm Ir.
Time of Fall: 4,000 to 6,000 years ago
The first record of the
Campo was in 1576. A Spanish governor learned of the iron from the
Indians who reportedly believed that it had fallen from heaven.
The
governor sent an expedition under the command of one Captain de Miraval
who brought back a few pieces of a huge iron mass he called Meson
de Fierro
(large table of iron).The location of the find
was the Campo del Cielo (field of the sky or heaven), a fitting name
for the location of a meteorite.
Since the Indians believed that the irons fell from heaven the name
may have come from the meteorites.
The area is an open brush-covered plain that has little water and
no other rocks--very good country in which to locate meteorites.
The next record of Campo Del Cielo meteorites was about 200 years
later in the late 1770s.
The Spanish thought some pieces might be silver ore, but once they
tried to process it, they found that it was only iron.
A Spanish navy lieutenant excavated one specimen which he believed
weighed 14 to 18 tons. This may have been the Meson de Fierro.
He left he mass in place and it was not seen again--or was it?In the 1800s more smaller
irons were found.
A pair of flintlock pistols reportedly made of this material were
given to President James Monroe. Later analyses showed that the iron
was not meteoritic.
In the 1900s. systematic exploration revealed many more large masses;
however, the Meson de Fierro remained lost.
386 g 120 Euro sold |
325 g 100 Euro sold |
270 g 90 Euro sold
|
16,4 g 22 Euro sold
10,4 g 14 Euro sold |
13,6 g 18 Euro sold |
8,7 g 13 Euro sold
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13,2 g 17 Euro sold |
18,0 g 25 Euro sold
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6,1 g 10 Euro
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6,4 g 11 Euro sold
Please click on images
to enlarge, sometimes backsides are shown
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