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Sikhote-Alin Meteorite

 
Sikhote Alin Meteorite

 
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Sikhote-Alin Meteorite
 
 
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Sikhote-Alin is an iron
Iron meteorite

Iron meteorites consist overwhelmingly of nickel-iron alloys. The metal taken from these meteorites is known as meteoric iron and was one of the earliest sources of usable iron available to man....
 meteorite
Meteorite

A meteorite is a natural object originating in outer space that survives an impact with the Earth's surface. While in space it is called a meteoroid....
 that fell in 1947 on the Sikhote-Alin Mountains in Russia
Russia

Russia , or the Russian Federation , is a list of countries spanning more than one continent country extending over much of northern Eurasia....
. This fall is among the largest meteorite showers in recent history.

History
At around 10:30 am on February 12, 1947, eyewitnesses in the Sikhote-Alin Mountains, Primorye
Primorsky Krai

Primorsky Krai also known as Primorye , is a federal subjects of Russia of Russia . Primorsky means "maritime" in Russian, hence the region is sometimes referred to as Maritime Province....
, Russia, observed a large bolide brighter than the Sun
Sun

The Sun , a G V star, is the star at the center of the Solar System. The Earth and other matter orbit the Sun, which by itself accounts for about 98.6% of the Solar System's mass....
 that came out of the north and descended at an angle of about 41 degrees.






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Sikhote-Alin is an iron
Iron meteorite

Iron meteorites consist overwhelmingly of nickel-iron alloys. The metal taken from these meteorites is known as meteoric iron and was one of the earliest sources of usable iron available to man....
 meteorite
Meteorite

A meteorite is a natural object originating in outer space that survives an impact with the Earth's surface. While in space it is called a meteoroid....
 that fell in 1947 on the Sikhote-Alin Mountains in Russia
Russia

Russia , or the Russian Federation , is a list of countries spanning more than one continent country extending over much of northern Eurasia....
. This fall is among the largest meteorite showers in recent history.

History


At around 10:30 am on February 12, 1947, eyewitnesses in the Sikhote-Alin Mountains, Primorye
Primorsky Krai

Primorsky Krai also known as Primorye , is a federal subjects of Russia of Russia . Primorsky means "maritime" in Russian, hence the region is sometimes referred to as Maritime Province....
, Russia, observed a large bolide brighter than the Sun
Sun

The Sun , a G V star, is the star at the center of the Solar System. The Earth and other matter orbit the Sun, which by itself accounts for about 98.6% of the Solar System's mass....
 that came out of the north and descended at an angle of about 41 degrees. The bright flash and the deafening sound of the fall were observed for three hundred kilometres around the point of impact not far from Luchegorsk
Luchegorsk

Luchegorsk is an urban-type settlement and administrative center of Pozharsky District of Primorsky Krai, Russia. It was founded in 1966 on a bank of Kontrovod River....
 and approximately 440 km northeast of Vladivostok
Vladivostok

File:vladivostokrussia.jpgVladivostok is Russia's largest port types of inhabited localities in Russia on the Pacific Ocean and the administrative center of Primorsky Krai....
. A smoke trail, estimated at 32 km long, remained in the sky for several hours.

As the meteorite — traveling at a speed of about 14 km/s — entered the atmosphere, it began to break apart, and the fragments fell together. At an altitude of about 5.6 km, the largest mass apparently broke up in a violent explosion.

On November 20, 1957 the Soviet Union
Soviet Union

The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was a Constitution of the Soviet Union socialist state that existed in Eurasia from 1922 to 1991.The name is a translation of the , romanization of Russian Soyuz Sovetskikh Sotsialisticheskikh Respublik, abbreviated ????, SSSR....
 issued a stamp for the 10th anniversary of the Sikhote-Alin meteorite shower. It reproduces a painting by P. J. Medvedev, a Russian artist who witnessed the fall: he was sitting in his window starting a sketch when the fireball appeared, so he immediately began drawing what he saw.

Orbit

Because the meteorite
Meteorite

A meteorite is a natural object originating in outer space that survives an impact with the Earth's surface. While in space it is called a meteoroid....
 fell during daytime, it was observed by many eyewitnesses. Evaluation of this observational data allowed V. G. Fesenkov, then chairman of the meteorite committee of the USSR Academy of Science
Russian Academy of Sciences

The Russian Academy of Sciences consists of the national academy of Russia and a network of scientific research institutes from across the Russian Federation as well as auxiliary scientific and social units like libraries, publishers and hospitals....
, to estimate the meteoroid's
Meteoroid

A meteoroid is a small sand to boulder sized particle of debris in the Solar System. The visible path of a meteoroid that enters Earth Earth's atmosphere is called a meteor, or commonly a "shooting star" or "falling star"....
 orbit
ORBit

ORBit is a Common Object Request Broker Architecture 2.4 compliant Object Request Broker . It features mature C , C++ and Python bindings, and less developed bindings for Perl, Lisp , Pascal , Ruby , and Tcl....
 before it encountered the Earth. This orbit was ellipse
Ellipse

In mathematics, an ellipse is the apparent shape of a circle viewed obliquely from outside it, as distinct from a hyperbola which is the shape seen from inside....
-shaped, with its point of greatest distance from the sun
Sun

The Sun , a G V star, is the star at the center of the Solar System. The Earth and other matter orbit the Sun, which by itself accounts for about 98.6% of the Solar System's mass....
 situated within the asteroid belt
Asteroid belt

The asteroid belt is the region of the Solar System located roughly between the orbits of the planets Mars and Jupiter. It is occupied by numerous irregularly shaped bodies called asteroids or minor planets....
, similar to many other small bodies crossing the orbit of the Earth. Such an orbit was probably created by collisions within the asteroid belt.

Size

Sikhote-Alin is a massive fall. The overall size of the meteoroid
Meteoroid

A meteoroid is a small sand to boulder sized particle of debris in the Solar System. The visible path of a meteoroid that enters Earth Earth's atmosphere is called a meteor, or commonly a "shooting star" or "falling star"....
 has been estimated at just under 900,000 kg. Krinov had estimated the post atmospheric mass of the meteoroid at some 70,000 kg. A more recent estimate by Tsvetkov (and others) puts the mass at around 100,000 kg.

Strewn field

The strewn field
Strewn field

The term strewnfield indicates the area where meteorites from a single fall are dispersed.It is also often used with tektites produced by large meteorite impact....
 for this meteorite covered an elliptical area of about 1.3 kmē. Some of the fragments made craters, the largest of which was about 26 m across and 6 m deep. Fragments of the meteorite were also driven into the surrounding trees.

Composition and classification

The Sikhote-Alin meteorite is classified as an iron meteorite
Iron meteorite

Iron meteorites consist overwhelmingly of nickel-iron alloys. The metal taken from these meteorites is known as meteoric iron and was one of the earliest sources of usable iron available to man....
 belonging to the chemical group IIAB and with a coarse octahedrite
Octahedrite

Octahedrites are the most common class of iron meteorites.They are composed primarily of the nickel-iron alloys: taenite - high nickel content, and kamacite - low nickel content....
 structure. It is composed of approximately 93% iron
Iron

Iron is a chemical element with the symbol Fe and atomic number 26. Iron is a Group 8 element and period 4 element. Iron is lustrous and silvery in color....
, 5.9% nickel
Nickel

Nickel is a chemical element, with the chemical symbol Ni and atomic number 28. It is a silvery-white lustrous metal with a slight golden tinge....
, 0.42% cobalt
Cobalt

Cobalt is a hard, lustrous, grey metal, a chemical element with symbol Co and atomic number 27. Although cobalt-based colors and pigments have been used since ancient times, and miners have long used the name kobold ore for some minerals, cobalt was only discovered in 1735 by Georg Brandt....
, 0.46% phosphorus
Phosphorus

Phosphorus is the chemical element that has the symbol P and atomic number 15. The name comes from the and . A Valency nonmetal of the nitrogen group, phosphorus is commonly found in inorganic phosphate minerals....
, and 0.28% sulfur
Sulfur

Sulfur or sulphur is the chemical element that has the atomic number 16. It is denoted with the symbol S. It is an abundant Valence non-metal....
, with trace amounts of germanium
Germanium

Germanium is a chemical element with the symbol Ge and atomic number 32. It is a lustrous, hard, greyish-white metalloid in the carbon group, chemically similar to its group neighbors tin and silicon....
 and iridium
Iridium

Iridium is the chemical element with atomic number 77, and is represented by the symbol Ir. A very hard, brittle, silvery-white transition metal of the platinum group, iridium is the second densest element and is the most corrosion-resistant metal, even at temperatures as high as 2000 ?C....
. Minerals present include taenite
Taenite

Taenite is a mineral found naturally on Earth mostly in iron meteorites. It is an alloy of iron and nickel, with nickel proportions of 20% up to 65%....
, plessite
Plessite

Plessite is a fine-grained mixture of the minerals kamacite and taenite found in the octahedrite iron meteorites. It occurs in gaps between the larger bands of kamacite and taenite which form Widmanst?tten patterns....
, troilite, chromite
Chromite

Chromite is iron magnesium chromium oxide: Cr2O4. It is an oxide mineral belonging to the spinel group. Magnesium can substitute for iron in variable amounts; also, aluminium and ferric iron commonly substitute for chromium....
, kamacite
Kamacite

Kamacite is a mineral. It is an alloy of iron and nickel, usually in the proportions of 90:10 to 95:5 although impurities such as cobalt or carbon may be present....
, and schreibersite
Schreibersite

Schreibersite is a rare iron nickel phosphide mineral, 3P, found in iron-nickel meteorites. Another name used for the mineral is rhabdite....
.

Specimens

Specimens of the Sikhote-Alin Meteorite are basically of two types:
  1. individual, thumbprinted or regmaglypted specimens, showing fusion crust and signs of atmospheric ablation
    Ablation

    Ablation is defined as the removal of material from the surface of an object by vaporization, chipping, or other erosion processes. The term occurs in space physics associated with atmospheric reentry, in glaciology, medicine and passive fire protection....
  2. shrapnel or fragmented specimens, sharp edged pieces of torn metal showing evidence of violent fragmentation
The first type probably broke off the main object early in the descent. These pieces are characterized by regmaglypts (cavities resembling thumb prints) in the surface of each specimen. The second type are fragments which were either torn apart during the atmospheric explosions or blasted apart upon impact on the frozen ground. Most were probably the result of the explosion at 5.6 km altitude.

A large specimen is on display in Moscow
Moscow

Moscow is the capital and the largest types of inhabited localities in Russia of the Russian Federation. It is also the largest European cities and metropolitan areas, with the Moscow metropolitan area ranking among the largest urban areas in the world....
, many other specimens are held by Russian Academy of Science and a great number of smaller specimens have made their way into the collector's market.

See also

  • Meteorite
    Meteorite

    A meteorite is a natural object originating in outer space that survives an impact with the Earth's surface. While in space it is called a meteoroid....
  • Meteorite fall


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