Asteroid evidence is in
By: Bob Weber
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The remains of asteroid that exploded in the sky near Alberta/Saskatchewan border. (BRUCE EDWARDS / CANWEST NEWS SERVICE)
BUZZARD COULEE, Sask. -- Scientists have found fragments of a 10-tonne asteroid that exploded in the skies over the Prairie provinces earlier this month -- lying on top of the ice of a family fish pond.
Dr. Alan Hildebrand and graduate student Ellen Milley said they were driving through a rural area southeast of Lloydminster, which straddles Alberta and Saskatchewan, when they spotted chunks of the black, crusty rock.
"We were driving by and I happened to notice two spots on the ice. We stopped the car and checked," Milley said, noting the fist-sized meteor chunks were covered in a dimple pattern.
"It is my first time in a search party. I am delighted that this resulted in a positive find. It is very cool."
The University of Calgary scientists collected about 12 pieces of the space rock and said they were organizing a search party to follow the meteor's trajectory in hopes of finding more.
Ian Mitchell, who owns the land where the fragments fell, said for years the family has called the small body of water that they stock with trout every summer "the fish pond."
"I guess we will call it the meteorite pond now," Mitchell joked, adding that his 12-year-old son is excited about the find and at the news that the family legally owns the rocks.
Under Canadian law, meteors may be bought and sold, but a federal permit is required to export them.
The university estimated there could be thousands of meteorite pieces strewn over a 20-square-kilometre area.
People in Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta have been buzzing about the huge fireball that lit up the night sky over the three provinces on Nov. 20. Witnesses reported hearing sonic boom rumblings and said the fiery flash was as bright as the sun.
Hildebrand, a co-ordinator of the Canadian Fireball Reporting Centre with the Canadian Space Agency, estimated that the meteor could have been seen as far as 700 kilometres away.
It contained about one-tenth of a kiloton of energy when it entered the earth's atmosphere on Nov. 20, roughly the equivalent of 100 tons of the chemical explosive TNT.
Robert Haag, a space rock collector from Arizona, has offered up to $12,000 for the first one-kilogram chunk of the meteor that is found.
-- The Canadian Press
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