Bob's Bulletin - Vol. 2 No. 1 -- Unclassified USA Meteorites from Coyote Dry Lake

A newsletter for “orphaned” meteorites from the USA.

Featured this month is Coyote Dry Lake (circa 1995-2004)

 

This volume of my Bulletin of unclassified U.S. meteorites features a new format for documenting these “orphaned” finds. Hopefully this will be a more convenient format for when there are more than 100 finds to be reported. It is also conveniently coincidental with this being the 20th anniversary of the first reported Coyote Dry Lake meteorite being found (late 1995). I find it hard to believe that it has already been 20 years since I made that first find. It is also the 10 year anniversary for the first time that Coyote Dry Lake meteorites appeared in a publication. I’ve appended my abstract to that paper at the end of this article for the reader’s convenience.

Strangely, there hasn’t been anything published since then, so maybe this is a good opportunity to remind researchers about this unique meteorite locality. But this article is not going to be an “update” on recent recoveries. That will have to be a follow-up bulletin to this article. This article will be more like a historical perspective of the first 10 years of this locality, focusing on the period of time from 1995 to 2004.

Even though that period of time has already been recorded and documented, whatever data and information that can be retrieved at this present time only pertains to those few Coyote Dry Lake finds that were selected for classification. And although provisional numbers were assigned by the NomCom to all of the other unclassified finds, it has recently been brought to my attention that the recovery data that was submitted for over 250 finds can no longer be found in the Meteoritical Bulletin Database. Back then, there was no on-line database and provisional numbers did not appear in print. Over the years and during the transition to an on-line database, this block of data became missing. But it wasn’t lost to history, because fortunately, I still held onto this data.

So, I’m taking this opportunity to make this data available, again, by publishing it on-line here in this bulletin.

The following “Bulletin” is just one example of an alternative way in which to document unclassified meteorites from the USA. It is my hope that this compilation will bring attention to the problem of the large number of unclassified meteorites found here in the USA, that are going undocumented. Hopefully, some volunteers will offer to help establish an on-line database that will document these “orphans”.

Newsletter for Orphaned Meteorites from USA – Volume 2 No. 1 — January 2016

• Meteorite-Recovery Information
• Table of Known (as of year 2004) Meteorite Specimens Recovered from Coyote Dry Lake:
  • Specimens – from 1995 to 2004 – CyDL 001 thru CyDL 235

This “Bulletin” is just one example of a way in which to record U.S. OC meteorite finds. Hopefully, this compilation will bring attention to the problem of the increasingly large number of meteorites found here in the USA, not only going unclassified, but even going unreported. Hopefully, some volunteers will offer to help establish a similar database that will document these “orphans”.

In the meanwhile, I will do my part and continue to gather meteorite-recovery data, and along with others, make a list of known meteorites, that otherwise, would eventually become “forgotten meteorites”.

References:

Number of 
classified finds 
(stones)

21 

Previous Bob’s Bulletins:

Bob’s Bulletin – Vol. 1 No. 1 — In my first Bulletin, I introduced the phrase “orphaned-meteorites from the USA”. I defined these “orphans” as being un-witnessed-fall Ordinary Chondrite (OC) meteorite “finds” that are recovered in the U.S.

Unfortunately, the vast majority of U.S. finds are of this type. I went on to write that these U.S. finds were being orphaned from the family of “approved” meteorites for the following reasons:

1) The lack of funding for U.S. researchers to authenticate, classify, and document/record these U.S. OC finds has resulted in several new [negative]; trends.

2) The increasing trend of commercializing the classifying of meteorites by U.S. researchers has priced U.S. OC finds out of the market, and

3) The increasing trend of U.S. researchers to turn away OC finds, even when finders of U.S. OC meteorites are willing to pay for their classification.

Bob’s Bulletin – Vol. 1 No. 2 — In my 2nd Bulletin, I went into more detail about why I use the phrase “orphaned-meteorites from the USA”. I focused on the lack of U.S.-tax-dollar-funding and why no funding was going towards the classification of these particular meteorites. In hindsight, I now realize that I should have pointed-out that there is also a lack of funding for just authenticating and recording that a U.S. meteorite has been found. This function should never be confused with “classifying” a meteorite, which is obviously way more labor intensive and costly.

Bob’s Bulletin – Vol. 1 No. 3 — In my 3rd Bulletin, I proposed the idea of an on-line database for these “orphaned” and other unclassified U.S. meteorites. This would have to be an all-volunteer effort, much in the same manner that the American Meteor Society has established the Fireball Reporting System. This database would give finders a central point to report their finds and have a field ID number issued to them. This “Field ID” would reflect which US state and date of find. The function of this database should not be confused with already established processes of getting a meteorite “classified”, which is obviously way more labor intensive and costly.

Bob’s Bulletin – Vol. 1 No. 4 — In my 4th Bulletin, I reported that several U.S. researchers were volunteering their time and effort to record and publish meteorite falls and finds, such as, Creston and Misfits Flat. I suggested that this method of cataloging newly found US meteorite specimens could be expanded, but the main hindrance is that there is no funding for this kind of effort.

Meteoritical Bulletin: the search results for all provisional meteorites found in “USA” – Published by Meteoritical Society – Meteoritical Bulletin, Database.

Meteorites of California the list of formally-recognized California meteorite falls and finds.

My previous Bob’s Findings articles can be found *HERE*

If you would like to sponsor any of these orphans, and help in the funding for getting them classified, in order to get them entered into the Meteoritical Bulletin Database, then please contact me by email: bolidechaser at yahoo-dot-com

Funding for the maintenance of the "Bob's Findings" website is supported by: Bob's Meteorites and the Meteorite-Recovery Lab.