It is amazing that meteorites continue to come off of Roach Dry Lake. It has been pounded hard by the Gesslers, John Blennert and I, and countless others.
Regards,
John
At 11:57 PM 4/3/02 -0500, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
Hi All
I recently had the opportunity to travel to Las Vegas for a convention. Fortunately I had some extra time and was able meet up with a collecting friend of mine who lives in Las Vegas. Some of you might have met him in Tucson. His name is Kim Cathcart.
At the Tucson 2001 show I introduced him to meteorites and he instantly became a fan. I decided to go out in April 2001 and "teach" him how to find meteorites on the dry lake beds in Nevada. We searched hard for two days but came up empty handed. He asked me how he would know when he found a meteorite and I simply told him he would "just know". A couple of weeks later he called me up rather excited and said he had found not one but 5! separate fragments weighing 50-60 grams over an area of about 250' by 400' on Roach Lake on the Nevada/California border. I believe they are all probably pieces of Primm.
Of course I was quite excited and maybe even a little proud of the fact that my "pupil" was ready to graduate. I was the one who received the graduation present as he sent me one piece to keep. He did eventually find another piece weighing 7.97g of a meteorite from Roach Lake that I was only able to identify after cutting. This might be a new one but we are not sure just yet.
As I mentioned at the beginning I had another opportunity to "show" him how to hunt meteorites. The first day we went up to a lake by Rachel Nevada which is on the Extraterrestrial Highway near Area 51. No, we didn't see anything unusual nor did we find any meteorites.
The next day we went to his favorite spot Roach Lake. He showed me where he had found the 7.97g piece this year as well as the fragments he found last year. We hunted in these areas but came up empty handed. We decided to search in another area that was full of black basalt. I was getting somewhat discouraged as there were literally thousands of little black rocks. Kim then called me over and said he wanted to show me something. Of course it was meteorite. I suddenly realized that I must be an amazing teacher as this was his 7th meteorite in less than a year! This time I don't even get a consolation prize as it is too beautiful to cut.
The piece probably weighs 90-100 grams (Kim doesn't have a scale yet) with 90% fusion crust. I would guess it is a weather grade 1-2 but still has fairly dark fusion crust. It looks oriented but probably isn't.
I guess I probably should mention that I have never found a single meteorite. So I have decided to change my title to consultant. After all I can tell you what do but I just can't do it myself (my wife was a consultant:) ). Oh well I guess I now know what they mean by "always a bridesmaid and never a bride".
I have uploaded some pictures of Kim's most recent find to our to our website. I hope you enjoy them as much as I do.
Coolstuff
<http://jensenmeteorites.com/coolstuff.htm>
Mike
Mike Jensen
Bill Jensen
Jensen Meteorites
16730 E Ada PL
Aurora, CO 80017-3137
303-337-4361
Web Site: www.jensenmeteorites.com
Jensen Meteorites
John Gwilliam Meteorites
PO Box 26854
Tempe AZ 85285
http://www.meteoriteimpact.com
