[meteorite-list] Atmospheric ablation marks on Tektites?

From: Impactika at aol.com <Impactika_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Fri, 4 Apr 2008 23:09:52 EDT
Message-ID: <c56.30a5f2e0.35284780_at_aol.com>

Hello Mike and List,

There is some confusion here.
Libyan Desert Glass is an impact glass, not a tektite.
It is 20-30 millions years old, has gone thru many changes in climate and
conditions in their corner of the Sahara. But in the last few thousands of
years, it has mostly been shaped/ablated/sculpted by zillions of sand storms.
More like Ventrifacts really
Does that help?

Anne M. Black
www.IMPACTIKA.com
IMPACTIKA at aol.com
Vice-President of IMCA
www.IMCA.cc
------------------------------------------------------------------------

In a message dated 4/4/2008 8:37:13 PM Mountain Daylight Time,
michael_w_gilmer at yahoo.com writes:
Hi Group!

While reading through another Meteorite-related
message board on the WWW, I ran across a statement by
an IMCA member that puzzles me somewhat. A discussion
about Libyan Desert Glass was ongoing, and we were
sharing photos of our LDG specimens. (and I showed
off my new 9+ gram piece of dark-veined glass from
Michael Farmer - thanks Mike!)

So the guy says :

"This is one of my favorites and is fully oriented
with regmaglypts (yes, tektite impactites can have
atmospheric ablation patterns too)."

Ok, here is my confusion - I was under the impression
that tektites were formed on impact - on Earth. So,
doesn't this mean they cannot have atmospheric
ablation patterns? Assuming the tektite never passed
through the atmosphere, I don't see how this is
possible.

I have seen tektites with features that resemble
regmaglypts and orientation, but this is just chance
occurence, right?

Or do I need to be schooled here?

Thanks in advance!

MikeG




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Received on Fri 04 Apr 2008 11:09:52 PM PDT