[meteorite-list] Chiang Khan differences of opinion

From: Dave Gheesling <dave_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Sun, 23 Mar 2008 22:46:38 -0400
Message-ID: <F98252CA85A940C1B2C31AF91E95638A_at_meteorroom>

Michael & List,
My anonymous reference to you as "a dealer" was to protect you from any
perception of shenanigans on your part, though by no means did I ever have
that perception myself (again, the research was and is as much the
responsibility of the buyer as it is of the seller, and the information
circulating as a result of the TKW question and the Chiang-Khan example have
been well worth the trade in and of themselves). This was just one of a
couple of examples I threw out to get a topic in circulation, and Jeff gave
a more than adequate answer to the question. It seems that there's a
certain responsibility on just about everyone involved to properly record
the outcome of these events and that the science side is willing to do
whatever they need to, within reason, to get the record straight so to speak
(symbiotic, as it should be). Even the uncertain stories in the world of
meteorites are part of the fun and mystique...
Dave

-----Original Message-----
From: Michael L Blood [mailto:mlblood at cox.net]
Sent: Sunday, March 23, 2008 7:25 PM
To: dave at fallingrocks.com; mmorgan at mhmeteorites.com; Martin Altmann;
Meteorite List
Subject: Re: [meteorite-list] Chiang Khan differences of opinion

Hi Dave & all,
        Regarding your post below....
        My information regarding TKW of the Chiang-Khan fall is from
The primary finder and author of the web page cited by Martin Altmann:

http://www.meteorite-oliver.com/About_Chiang_Khan/about_chiang_khan.html

        Of particular interest is the comment therein:

" Nobody was able anymore to give precise indications as to the exact date
of the event. Some 20 years ago it was, so they say, in the month of
November, without doubt - that's what I was told in the villages of the
strewn field.
Whatever it was that happened then - one is led to presume a second
meteorite fall on the same day or on the day after. According to recent
research (isotope analysis), the two large specimens, which are in private
Collection and in Chulalongkorn University, Bangkok, do not originate from
the Chiang-Khan fall. They are believed to have been transported into
Thailand from Laos. Two small pieces from Thailand were analyzed, one is H4
tending to H5; one was determined to be H5 in Japan, whereas the large
pieces are H6. Most of all, the noble gas contents of the large specimens
differ extremely from those of the Chiang-Khan pieces!"

        Please note that this is also weighted by the comments by Jeff
Grossman Sent: Saturday, March 22, 2008 11:58 PM
To: Meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com
Subject: Re: [meteorite-list] More on Chiang Khan

"The Meteoritical Bulletin does publish
announcements of new masses when they are
significant. Submit the report to the
editor. You will need good evidence that the
additional mass is really part of same fall."

        Please also note that I have every reason to believe that both Bob
Haag and Matt Morgan believe the piece in reference is part of the
Chiang-Khan fall. However, this believe might be weighted against
The above comments (and I acknowledge I could be wrong on this).
        I recognized your reference of source for purchase as "a dealer" was
Almost certainly intended to protect me from any perception of shenanigans
In this matter - and I thank you for your intent. However, I was fully aware
Of all of the above comments and felt confident the major finder and the
Meteoritical Bulletin were correct in their assessment of related falls,
just as I am confident there is no intention to deceive, whatsoever, on the
part of Bob Haag or Matt Morgan and that their belief in the authenticity of
the stone mentioned is both sincere and reasonable. People will have to
decide for themselves whom is correct and whom is in error. I sided with the
primary finders and the Meteoritical Bulletin. I see no way to resolve this
without individually typing the stone, but even that, like the Baygoria
cluster.... Er... controversy .... will not be conclusive if this (other?)
fall was also submitted and originally included as part of the Chiang-Khan
fall, anyway - but the Meteoritical Bulletin does not see it as such.
        Sincerely, Michael Blood


on 3/22/08 6:39 PM, Dave Gheesling at dave at fallingrocks.com wrote:

> Matt & List,
>
> First, Matt, thanks for the info and congrats on having that terrific
> specimen in your already spectacular collection...simply superb.
>
> This prompts a second question, which is "Why is there not a means to
> 'officially' correct the record when a fall or find turns out to have a
> dramatically different TKW at some point after the formal classification
has
> cleared?" I'm not talking about confusion in the early stages of mining a
> strewn field, but rather about falls and/or finds where in many cases
> decades have passed since the initial discoveries and, for all intents and
> purposes, everything that will ever be found has been found (a slippery
> slope of a generalization, but hopefully this makes sense). There are
many,
> many such examples, and I'll post a link to only one below (read Remarks
in
> my Djermaia listing):
>
> http://www.fallingrocks.com/Collections/Djermaia.htm
>
> I purchased my Chiang-Khan from a dealer without much research, which was
> completely my responsibility, to be clear. That said, it was marketed as
> representing something approaching 5% of the recovered material from that
> fall (which, again, is officially recorded as 367 grams when we know that
> there is one stone of almost twice that size and speculation on the list
is
> that the TKW is actually likely to be near 7 kilograms). We had some
banter
> about the finer points of orientation a couple of weeks ago and how that
has
> an impact in the marketplace, and it seems to me that this is at least as
> large an issue. And, forgetting the market altogether, shouldn't there
> perhaps be a more focused effort to "get the record straight" for the
> benefit of history? I'm probably missing something out of ignorance
here...
>
> Thanks in advance for thoughts and comments...always trying to learn
> something new.
>
> Dave
Received on Sun 23 Mar 2008 10:46:38 PM PDT