I think this may be a meteorite?????

[icemanmdd]

Hi Guys,<br />I hate for my first post(since coming back) to be a can you help me but I need help.<br />Can you guys point me in the right direction to identify this rock "meteorite"<br />Where can I take it? I live in Ohio. <br />Heres the story:<br /><br />Sitting in the living room my dad heard something hit the roof, thinking it was the neighborhood brats he runs outside and there is nothing, well he calls me up that night and tells me, I joke to him it was probably a meteorite, and he should go look around in the day time. He calls the next day and says I found it.<br />About 25 yards from the house in his fresh cut yard it laid. <br />I took it back to my house ground a corner and it appears to maybe be nickle with a soft gold color substance(possibly gold it's self) Running throughout. It is opaque in places where you could see the underlaying gold lines running throuh it. It is non magnetic, non at all, so if this is a meteorite then it is a rare breed. The gold lines running throughout are soft and can be dented eaily with the ball point of a pen. I ground a small spot and this thing is dead grey. Kinda puts me in mind of nickel. And ideas? Where can I take this to find out what we have. And either way I'llbe happy since where it was found could have came from the hillside near by, which would make this some pretty good gold ore <img src="/images/icons/smile.gif" /> But in all seriousness, I believe it to be a meteor by the way the surface looks compared to other pictures(except the gold part)<br />Thanks for the help,<br />Brian<br />Heres a link to my album:<br />http://www.villagephotos.com/pubbrowse.asp?selected=964724<br /><br /><br />And here is a pict:<br /><br /><br />

 

[icemanmdd]

heres picture

 

[silylene old]

That stone is rather odd looking. Bring it to a local university for an opinion.<br /><br />When I was about 15 yrs old (living in New Orleans East), I remember another boy (about 12 yrs old) in our neighborhood found what I suspected was an iron-meteorite in a foundation plot being scraped out of the swamp by a bulldozer. Prior to the digging, the area was a virgin cypress swamp. In the soil was a lumpy softball sized iron rock, since a magnet would adhere to it. It was a little rusty, and looked melted somewhat on one side. (No, it was not a lost canonball or some other manmade artifact). I suspected it was a meteorite and tried to buy it from him. But his father wouldn't let him sell it. They kept it on a shelf in their house afterwards. I guess I should've feigned less interest in the meteorite before I made an offer to buy it. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <div class="Discussion_UserSignature" align="center"><em><font color="#0000ff">- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -</font></em> </div><div class="Discussion_UserSignature" align="center"><font color="#0000ff"><em>I really, really, really miss the "first unread post" function.</em></font> </div> </div>

 

[igorsboss]

It was a meteor between the time it left the slingshot and the time it hit the roof. <img src="/images/icons/wink.gif" />

 

[mental_avenger]

If it was a meteorite, it would not have bounced off the roof, it would have made a hole. <br />Is it attracted to a magnet?<br /> <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p style="margin-top:0in;margin-left:0in;margin-right:0in" class="MsoNormal"><font face="Times New Roman" size="2" color="#ff0000"><strong>Our Solar System must be passing through a Non Sequitur area of space.</strong></font></p> </div>

 

[thalion]

I doubt it's a meteorite, but I hope I can give a few pointers.<br /><br />1.) Does it have a "fusion crust"? Many, if not most meteorites have a shiny, relatively smooth black surface that they get from "burning up" in the Earth's atmosphere.<br /><br />2.) Iron-nickel meteorites are rare--the vast majority are stony--but not surprisingly they make up most of the meteorites found, because their metal nature makes them easy to identify. Like MA asked, is it attracted to a magnet? Does it feel cold and unusually heavy for its size?<br /><br />3.) To my knowledge, a vein of gold has never been found in any meteorite, though that doesn't mean it can't happen.<br /><br />4.) Does it react to weak acids, like vinegar, by bubbling? If so, it's almost certainly a common terrestrial carbonate rock.<br /><br />There are places that you can send pieces of rock to find out if it's a meteorite. Unfortunately, it isn't cheap; one site charges $100 for professional identification. A college with a good astronomy or chemistry department would be a safer bet. A geologist--specifically, a petrologist or mineralogist--should also be able to find out if it's a common rock, perhaps in only a few minutes.<br /><br />Though you should prepare for disappointment, I truly wish you luck, and hope that it's the real thing. I've always wanted to find a meteorite, myself. <img src="/images/icons/smile.gif" /><br /><br />Here are some sites that I think may help:<br /><br />http://goldnrocks.net/meteoriteid<br /><br />http://home.earthlink.net/~magellon/IDWEB.html<br /><br />http://www.meteoritesaustralia.com/found.html

 

[icemanmdd]

Well check this out, my gold/ meteorite/ whatever , has grown a small crystal fatory(i think they are crystaline since they look like small glass filiments upon close inspection. So what is this stupid thing? picture coming shortly.

 

[CalliArcale]

<blockquote><font class="small">In reply to:</font><hr /><p>If you happen to be in out in the country among the fields and grasslands of Kansas, Nebraska, Oklahoma, or one of the other Great Plains states, any rock you happen to find is probably a meteorite. During the end of the last Ice Age, the winds blowing off of the vast ice sheets that covered Canada and the northermost states deposited a thick layer of loess, a fine-grained soil, over much of this region below the southernmost reaches of the glaciers. So thick is this layer and so quickly was it laid down (relatively speaking) that there was little opportunity for rocks created by geologic erosion to be deposited by any other means. Therefore, any actual rocks you happen to find lying around in these areas that could not be accounted for by human activity stands a very good chance of being from outer space!<p><hr /></p></p></blockquote><br /><br />That's not true of all of the Great Plains states. Only the southern ones. If you go to North Dakota, for instance, which was completely covered by glaciers, you'll find a lot of rocks with no relationship to the native bedrock. These are rocks which were delivered to the northern plains and the upper midwest by the glaciers. Many are volcanic in origin, but extremely ancient. So bear that in mind when looking for meteorites on the Great Plains. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p> </p><p><font color="#666699"><em>"People assume that time is a strict progression of cause to effect, but actually from a non-linear, non-subjective viewpoint it's more like a big ball of wibbly wobbly . . . timey wimey . . . stuff."</em>  -- The Tenth Doctor, "Blink"</font></p> </div>