[meteorite-list] Meteorite Questions

[Walter Branch]

Happy Labor Day to Americans!

I spent the day laboring the yard.

I wanted to thank everyone who sent me email (public and private) regarding 
my meteorite questions last week.  I now have more things to research.

-Walter Branch
________________________
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Walter Branch" <waltbranch at bellsouth.net>
To: "Meteorite List" <meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com>
Sent: Wednesday, August 29, 2007 7:14 PM
Subject: [meteorite-list] Meteorite Questions



> Hello Everyone,

>

> I have had plenty of time recently to ponder things such as meteorites.  I 

> am also alone at home at present and am bored.  Would some kind, 

> more-knowledgeable-than-me soul help me with some meteoritical questions.

>

> For example, why does the rim of meteor crater appear "squared" in some 

> photos, while in others it appears very round?  Perspective?  Lighting? 

> Extremely highly localized tectonic shifting (back and forth)?

>

> Also, why is Tatahouine so green? Olivine? Krylon?

>

> I am looking at a slice of NWA 4664 right now (thank you Eric Olson) and I 

> don't see any much green.  Maybe that one is a bad example because NWA 

> 4664 doesn't even look like at Diogenite!

>

> Also, I have read that some meteoroids travel through space in streams and 

> impact the Earth simultaneously (i.e., they have already broken up before 

> they hit the Earth's atmosphere).  How can this be?  I would think that 

> once a meteoroid has broken in space (most likely due to impact), minute 

> deviations of the individual pieces in the initial trajectory would 

> translate into ever increasing deviations in the individual piece's 

> trajectory, over time.  Unless two pieces were traveling in EXACTLY 

> parallel lines, over time the pieces would be widely dispersed in space.

>

> Remember comet Shoemaker-Levy 9?  It was broken apart by gravitational 

> forces from Jupiter only a year prior to impact, yet by the time it had 

> encountered the Jovian atmosphere the separation between the pieces was 

> wider than the diameter of the Earth!  After only a year.

>

> Traveling over eons to make it to the inner solar system, how can a 

> meteoroid stream stay intact enough to cause a tiny strewnfield on the 

> Earth? I would not think that the Earth's gravitational field would be 

> strong enough to do what Jupiter did.

>

> Also, I know I have asked this before but I still don't understand how 

> researchers can determine cosmic ray exposure ages for a meteorite which 

> ablated a significant portion of the material that absorbed most of the 

> cosmic rays and which may have fragmented in flight through the Earth's 

> atmosphere.

>

> Anyone?

>

> -Walter Branch

> ________________________

>

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