Gibeon Meteorite Information

Gibeon Meteorites

Although no one knows for sure when the Gibeon meteorite fell to earth, everyone agrees it was in prehistoric times; some speculate it was about 12,000 years ago. The strewn field it fell in is among the largest on earth, 70 miles wide by 230 miles long.

Nambia. While the locals had always collected pieces of the meteorite - to use for making tools - it was only relatively recently that they became available to the North American market. This was thanks to an enterprising meteorite collector named Robert Haag, who marched into the principal's office of a Nambian school and offered to pay children to bring him meteorites. When the children's families saw how easy it was to make money, everyone got into the act.

Most meteorites with a high iron content - such as the Gibeon Meteorite - were formed in the cores of asteroids at temperatures up to and over 2,500EF and were originally completely molten.
Very gradually - at a rate of perhaps 18-180EF per million years - the liquid metal cooled and began to crystallize. In cases where the percentage of nickel to iron in the cooling mixture was "just right," two alloys, Taenite and Kamacite, would form slightly different crystal structures which grew into and over each other.
The resulting intricate designs created by this intergrowth are called "Widmanstatten Figures" and are characteristic of many iron meteorites. Radiometric dating indicates the crystallization of Taenite and Kamacite in the Gibeon Meteorite took place more than 4 billion years ago.