Lunar Meteorite News

September 14, 2009: The deserts of the Shişr region of Oman have recently proved to be a fertile hunting ground for meteorites - three new and unpaired lunar meteorites have been reported from that part of the Arabian Peninsula:

Shişr 160 - LUN A - TKW 100.86g
Shişr 161 - LUN A - TKW 57.2g
Shişr 162 - LUN A - TKW 5,552g

The first two stones were found at separate locations on one and the same expedition in January 2008. While Shişr 160 represents a typical lunar feldspathic regolith breccia, Shişr 161 is a much more complicated lunar fragmental breccia. An abstract by Foreman et al has been published at the 40th LPSC in March 2009, entitled Petrographic and Geochemical Analysis of Feldspathic Lunar Meteorite Shisr 161. I'm glad that I could get the adjacent slice of the sample from which the thin section was cut which is discussed here - see the "NCC Feature Sample" to the right.
The third stone, Shişr 162, has been found in 2006, but it only came to light more recently. It's a sensational find because it represents the third largest lunar meteorite known - with a weight of 5.5kg it's huge!

January 28, 2009: Two new paired lunar meteorites have been approved by the Meteoritical Society, and published in The Meteoritical Bulletin Database:

Northwest Africa 4936 - LUN A - TKW 199g
Northwest Africa 5406 - LUN A - TKW 281.1g

This lunar meteorite consists of 8 individual stones that were recovered near Siksou Mountain, Morocco, and published under two separate NWA numbers. According to Dr. Randy Korotev it is the first lunar meteorite to be compositionally similar to Apollo 16 soil, and which may actually have originated from near the Apollo 16 landing site. Please visit Randy Korotev's NWA 4936/5406 page for more details. >> continue to archive >>