Barntrup meteorite, Barntrup, Lippe, Detmold, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germanyi

Regional Level Types
Barntrup meteorite	Meteorite Fall Location
Barntrup	Town
Lippe	District
Detmold	Administrative District
North Rhine-Westphalia	State
Germany	Country

Ordinary chondrite, veined (LL4)
Fall, 28 May 1886; 17 g

During the afternoon of a nearly cloudless day, a farmer heard repeated gunfire-like sounds, followed shortly by thunder-like rumblings. In the midst of the rumblings, a small meteorite came crashing through the branches of a nearby tree. An oriented stone, possessing both a pyramidal cone and a fusion crust, the meteorite soon came under scientific scrutiny. Chondrules and other normal chondritic features were noted and the mass primarily divided between Detmold and more distant Wiens. More recent studies of the smaller Wiens mass have revealed more details. Within a dense grey matrix are the expected silicates — olivine, pyroxene, albitic plagioclase — as well as minor sulfides and Fe-Ni metal. Olivine (Fa~28) and pyroxene (Fs~24) composition provide the LL chondrite classification. Veins and small amounts of glass suggest a preterrestrial impact sometime between mild metamorphism on an ancient original parent body and its very recent earth encounter. Perhaps a little surprisingly, Fe-Ni metal in the smaller sample is all taenite (25-33 wt%Ni).

The LL Chondrites (very low total Fe) with 98 recognized falls represent approximately 8.5% of all classified or partially classified meteorite falls. They are the smallest of the 3 ordinary chondrite geochemical groups. Barntrup is the least massive of the 4 recognized German LL chondrite falls. Indeed, Barntrup is the least massive of all 32 recognized German meteorite falls (25 ordinary chondrites and 7 others.) Virtually all of the recovered mass is either in Detmold (9.5 g) or at the Naturhistorisches Museum in Wiens (6 g).

Other Regions, Features and Areas containing this locality

References