Museum acquires recently fallen meteorite from Junction City, Georgia

A meteorite exploded over south Georgia in the course of the in a single day hours of September 26, 2022, spraying fragments throughout the small city of Junction Metropolis, Georgia, and Tellus Science Museum has already acquired a chunk of the space rock.

At 12:04 am EDT that morning, the meteorite burst right into a vivid fireball that lit up the sky over Talbot County. The meteor was captured flying throughout the sky by a digicam operated by planetary astronomer Dr. Ed Albin. After analyzing radar data and watching the captured video, Dr. Albin and fellow meteorite hunters Pat Department and Carl Dietrich decided the situation of the autumn.

Being the primary to reach on the scene, the three noticed a small affect crater on a highway and scoured the world to seek out any fragments of the fallen meteorite. After intense looking, the three hunters had been all in a position to gather items of the meteorite. The second largest, a 219-gram specimen discovered by Dietrich, was acquired by Tellus. “I received fortunate,” mentioned Dietrich, who wished the meteorite to be displayed in a Georgia museum.

“That is very thrilling, as a result of discovering a meteorite quickly after it falls is a really uncommon event, and it fell right here in Georgia,” mentioned Tellus Govt Director Jose Santamaria. “And to assume—this rock was in space a bit of over three weeks in the past.” The meteorite has been tentatively recognized as a chondrite, generally referred to as a stony meteorite. Additional classification is below approach.

“I’m thrilled that Tellus Science Museum is ready to additional protect Georgia’s meteoritic heritage with the acquisition of this specimen,” says Tellus Curator Ryan Roney.

For the reason that discovering of the unique fragments, Albin has returned to the location quite a few occasions and has been greeted by many meteorite hunters from throughout the nation. Thus far there was a few dozen fragments discovered.

“I am positive there are a lot of items nonetheless to be discovered,” mentioned Albin. “It was estimated that the meteor coming by our ambiance was perhaps the scale of a washer or a small fridge.” Tentatively referred to as the Junction Metropolis Meteorite, it marks the twenty seventh Georgia meteorite, the eleventh Georgia meteorite in Tellus Science Museum’s assortment, and sixth witnessed fall within the state.

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Tellus Science Museum