From: Jeff Grossman<jgross...@usgs.gov>
Subject: Re: [meteorite-list] Quick Question about Sahara xxxxx finds
To: meteorite-list@meteoritecentral.com
Date: Sunday, December 19, 2010, 7:44 AM
There are several issues and a
misconception here.
Misconception: The Nomenclature Committee (NomCom) does not
change the names of meteorites once they are accepted,
except in extraordinary circumstances (e.g., the Gao/Guenie
nomenclatural nightmare). To do so would cause endless
confusion. All of the Nova meteorites were named that
way when they were initially published in the Bulletin.
The "Sahara" series, which were collected and so-named by
the Labenne family, predates the "NWA" series by several
years. In the late 1997, the Sahara meteorites were
being sold under this name, several groups of scientists
wanted to publish on them, and the NomCom had to figure out
what to do about their names. The choices were to
accept these names, convince the Labennes to rename them, or
to rename them ourselves for the official
announcement. For several reasons, Sahara was
accepted. First, the names were already coming into
widespread use, and renaming them would cause a mess.
Second, it was understood that the coordinates would be
released, perhaps in five years, once the area was hunted
out (this never happened, but I still hope it will).
The vote to establish the NWA series came in 2000, when it
became clear that the Saharan nomenclature problem was
growing in magnitude. It seems possible that, had the
Labenne meteorites appeared after this date, NomCom would
have insisted that they all be called NWA. But
probably not: we thought that Tunisia, eastern
Algeria, Niger, and Libya were all possible collection
areas, and these are not in the NWA area, which is defined
as "Morocco and adjacent parts of the surrounding
countries."
Given all of this, probably the ideal names for the Labenne
meteorites would have been Sahara 001 - Sahara xxx, but what
was done was done.
Jeff
On 12/18/2010 2:25 PM, Greg Catterton wrote:
Many will provide false information or not any at all
to keep the location secret. There is a discussion elsewhere
currently about a finder lying about the location to secure
the material available.
Algeria has laws preventing the export of meteorites,
yet there are new ones coming out everyday. Even recent
Lunars from there are accepted and sold. All one has to do
is simply say NWA.
Berduc was the same way, many were transported outside
the country and claimed to have been found elsewhere.
I have seen many others questioned about locations and
even know of one person who has outright lied about where a
stone was recovered to keep from paying the land owner the
share agreed on and created a laughable story of the find
that has been published with so many flaws, it looks like a
scam ad on ebay. I bet some of you have a piece of it in
your collection and dont even know the whole story behind
it!
I think it happens more then we would really want to
know.
Greg Catterton
www.wanderingstarmeteorites.com
IMCA member 4682
On Ebay: http://stores.shop.ebay.com/wanderingstarmeteorites
On Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/WanderingStarMeteorites
--- On Sat, 12/18/10, Michael Gilmer<meteoritem...@gmail.com>
wrote:
From: Michael Gilmer<meteoritem...@gmail.com>
Subject: [meteorite-list] Quick Question about
Sahara xxxxx finds
To: meteorite-list@meteoritecentral.com
Date: Saturday, December 18, 2010, 1:51 PM
Hi Listees,
I have a quick question for the group and maybe
someone
here can shed
some light on this subject....
Meteorites that do not have find coordinates or
have
falsified find
coordinates are typically given the "Nova"
designation by
NonCom or if
they are from Northwest Africa, they are given the
"NWA"
designation.
In a handful of cases, a named meteorite was later
changed
to a "Nova"
because it was discovered that the find
coordinates were
incorrect or
dubious.
So, why after all of these years does the Sahara
xxxxx
finds (mostly
Labenne finds) are not referred to as "NWA" or
"Nova"? It is
well-known that the find coordinates on the many
of these
Labenne
Sahara finds are falsified, which has hurt science
and the
provenance
of the specimens. To this day, over a decade
later,
the true find
coordinates of these specimens have not been
revealed and
probably
will never be revealed.
Can someone explain the double-standard at work
here? Is it because
of the pioneering work and otherwise-respectable
work that
the
Labennes have done - despite the falsification of
the find
locations?
Why do these Sahara finds get special treatment,
while
other finds
with dubious locations are lumped under "NWA" or
"Nova" ?
I realize the NWA designation did not exist when
the Sahara
finds were
accepted by NonCom, but shouldn't they now receive
the
Nova
designation? In fact, the NWA designation
was
created, in part, due
to the confusion created by the Sahara
finds. So why
do they still
get a special place in nomenclature after all of
this
time?
Best regards,
MikeG
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Mike Gilmer - Galactic Stone& Ironworks
Meteorites
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