[meteorite-list] I'm getting confused by the MB coordinates

From: MexicoDoug <MexicoDoug_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Sat Aug 26 03:31:40 2006
Message-ID: <007901c6c8e1$91598e00$57cf5ec8_at_0019110394>

Walter:

Please don't shoot the messenger. But as hard as the Met Bulletin editorial
staff work, no one goes looking over the shoulders of most finders; the
greed of human nature combined especially in the older cases with the
trouble of interpolating coordinates (no GPS) from a topo map by many
finders, grabbing the nearest 10' or 15', etc., etc. , etc. etc. add up to
the exception frequently being the correct coordinate. Bad but that's life.
4 miles is pretty good. I am used to dealing with lots more than that as
I'm sure plenty of others are here, too.I bet even the Tucson Ring has
coordinates...

Read "Rocks from Space" again, the Bob Haag section. I know Richard Norton
makes a relevant comment in there somewhere about the accuracy of published
coordinates when Bob started hunting. The accurate falls tend to be the
ones with large strewn fields, if that makes sense...

Best wishes, Doug


----- Original Message -----
From: "Walter L. Newton" <newtonw2_at_comcast.net>
To: <meteorite-list_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Sent: Saturday, August 26, 2006 1:34 AM
Subject: [meteorite-list] I'm getting confused by the MB coordinates


> Hi
>
> Some of you may have remember being bored by my running dialog with the MB
> and Jeff in reference to the actual find spot of a Colorado meteorite.
>
> In the MB, the Apex Colorado meteorite has coordinates that puts the find
> (1938) at about 4 miles north of the actual location. I know the actual
> location because of the narrative in the MB, and Jack Murphy concurs. He
> knows where it was found and it's not where the MB coordinates have it.
>
> Now... a have a new girlfriend (yes, this is really going somewhere) and
> Steffanie lives in Russell Gulch Colorado, which is an old mining town
south
> and above Central City Colorado. It's listed as a ghost town even though
it
> has about 35 folks living there.
>
> Well, looking at the MB list of Colorado meteorites, low and behold, we
have
> a Russell Gulch meteorite, an iron, found in 1863.
>
> But, if you check the coordinates with Google Earth, the find spot would
be
> right in Central City Colorado... about 4 miles north of Russell Gulch.
>
> Do we see a pattern here. Steff is going to hook me up with an old timer
> that lives in Russell Gulch, who knows about the find and has a good idea
> where it was found.
>
> My question is (I promised this was going somewhere)... was some of the
> coordinates in the MB constructed from a different map datum. I vaguely
> remember something about different datum sets used for lat. and long. I
> don't really understand the details about this, but I know my simple GPS
> unit has a whole list of datum sets that I can set my unit to.
>
> Are the MB coordinates really right, but using a different "starting
point"
> then Google Earth.
>
> Otherwise, I guess I'm going to go off on another tangent with the MB
about
> another find spot.
>
> Maybe someone can point me to an online article that explains all this?
>
> I know this is not as earth shattering as losing a whole planet, but it
bugs
> me none the less.
>
> Stop me before it's too late. (did this make any sense?)
>
> Walter L. Newton
> Golden, Co
>
>
>
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Received on Sat 26 Aug 2006 03:30:52 AM PDT