The remaining half happens during overcast skies, leaving about two to three that are observable in theory, out of which only a tiny fraction actually get found. "Half of them happen during the daytime and go unobserved. "Generally speaking, for all types of meteorites, about 10 fireballs drop at least 300 grams of meteorites over an area the size of California, France, or Spain," Vida continued. He added that this could mean Asteroid 2024 BX 1 was much smaller than estimated, making it one of the smallest asteroids ever discovered. Some assumptions, such as the size and mass of the asteroid, might be incorrect, however, as the samples recovered appear to be a rare type of space rock, most likely aubrite, according to Vida. If it had a stony composition, Vida says that the asteroid likely weighed around 2 metric tons. He added that, thanks to light reflected off its body, Asteroid 2024 BX 1 exhibited an apparent magnitude of 32.8, which makes it one of the faintest asteroids ever discovered. "The next big step in the research is to understand what exactly we're looking at here," Jenniskens said.Ī meteorite fragment from asteroid 2024 BX1 (Image credit: courtesy of Peter Jenniskens) What sets these meteorites apart?ĭenis Vida, a meteor physics postdoctoral researcher at Western University, told that the parent body of the fragments found by Jenniskens and his team was part of a group of near-Earth asteroids called the "Apollo asteroids." The official classification of these meteorites hasn't been made yet, but Jenniskens hints that these samples could be something very special. "If you were walking through the fields and saw a rock like this, then you would pass by it." "What we're actually looking for was very different from what most people consider a meteorite," he said. ![]() Jenniskens said this particular search, however, was so challenging because whereas meteorites are usually easy to distinguish from more mundane Earth rocks - they tend to possess a dark, smooth look - these fragments strongly resembled terrestrial rocks. More recently, Jenniskens found himself in France with a similar goal. In 2008, for instance, he ran a meteorite-hunting expedition in Sudan as well as 10 years later in Botswana. ![]() The SETI scientist had led similar space rock searches for meteorites that came from asteroids detected in space before exploding in Earth's atmosphere. This isn't Jenniskens' first meteorite hunt.
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