Re: [meteorite-list] Mystery Meteorite Contest II

[Adam Hupe]

Dear List Members and contest participants,   First of all, I would like to thank everybody for their patience.  The classifications were supposed to be announced in Tucson.  This was overlooked at the very successful Blood auction because of the hectic pace.  Michael did not get out of there until after 1:00 am and did a remarkable job of managing hundreds of details.   This contest was designed to test visual identification skills.  Nobody guessed all three correctly but we will still award all of the specimens to different entrants.  The reason I used the word "guess" is because that is all one can do in the field.  I was wrong myself on the first two so do not feel bad if you did not get the answers correct.  This exercise demonstrates the importance of laboratory confirmation.  I have seen several people make pairing decisions on appearance alone.  This is not a good practice because several rarities can be overlooked.  We would have missed a rare polymict diogenite if we did not insist that every achondritic stone be tested.   Without further delay here are the classifications and winners:   1) NWA 1646 Cumulate Eucrite Breccia     This was the most confusing of the lot with guesses ranging from Lunar to Mercury.     Nobody guessed this one correctly so we drew a name from a hat.      Congratulations to Mark Fox   2) NWA 1647 Shocked Basaltic Eucrite (monomict)     Most people guessed an Aubrite which was my first impression, as well.     Congratulations to Martin Horejsi who was the first to guess this one.   3) NWA 1650 Polymict Eucrite Breccia     This one had the most correct responses.  A lot of entrants guessed a Howardite.     Congratulations to Mike Tettenborn who was the first to get this one correct.    This shows the diversity of Eucrites which can range greatly in appearance.  None of these samples look even remotely alike, yet they all fall into the Eucrite class.   With close to 40 entrants this was a fun contest. We were impressed with the number of List Members willing to step up to the plate and compete in a very difficult contest.  We hope this was educational and justified the bandwidth taken from Meteorite Central.   If you are a winner please send us an email with your mailing address so that we can distribute these specimens.     Wishing everybody the very best,   Adam and Greg Hupe The Hupe Collection IMCA 2185