I can now report with some authority that the total cost of 30+ years
of collecting by ANSMET has been in the range of $20
million. Considering the record of scientific achievements that has
been built on this collection of 20,000 specimens, I would have to
say it has been a bargain.
Jeff
Make your homework. How many different meteorites do we have from
Antarctica after a third of a century hunting and spending billions
of USD? 7000.
This statement, appearing in some of the recent emails, is
wrong. There are over 16,000 classified meteorites from the ANSMET
expeditions, plus a few thousand unclassified. Counting the
Japanese, Chinese,European,
Korean, and minor collections, There ~27,000 classified Antarctic
meteorites, and probably close to 20,000 not yet classified (mostly
in the Japanese and Chinese collections). And where in the world
did this figure of billions of dollars being spent by the US to
collect its 20,000 meteorites come from?
Also, don't overlook the fact that Antarctic meteorite have proven
to be vastly more valuable scientifically than NWA meteorites. They
probably occur as subjects of scientific publications at >10x the
frequency as NWA meteorites (I posted statistics on this some years
ago, but can't locate it at the moment). This is because the main
masses are well curated.
Jeff
Dr. Jeffrey N. Grossman phone: (703) 648-6184
US Geological Survey fax: (703) 648-6383
954 National Center
Reston, VA 20192, USA
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