University student finds bits of meteorite

The discovery on Thursday was part of a 10-ton fireball that lit up the prairie sky last week

By Keith Gerein and Luke Simcoe
Vancouver Sun, November 29, 2008

A University of Calgary student got the thrill of a lifetime when she found bits of meteorite from a fireball that lit up the sky over Alberta and Saskatchewan last week.

Master’s student Ellen Milley was travelling with meteorite expert Alan Hildebrand south of Lloydminster on Thursday afternoon when she noticed some dark bits on a small frozen pond.

The first dark mass they investigated was a disappointment—it turned out to be a leaf. But the next one proved to be a cosmic treasure: a 250-gram piece of black space rock, part of the 10-ton meteorite that fell from the sky.

“It’s incredibly exciting,” said Milley. “It’s a very unique opportunity, because not many meteorites are found in Canada.”

Milley actually spotted the first remnant and calls it “a very big moment in a very short career.” She won’t, however, attempt to claim a $10,000 reward offered for the first piece of the meteorite.

“We’re in it for the science,” she said.

They have since found more fragments spread over a cold cattle pasture 40 kilometres southeast of Lloydminster, on the border with Alberta about 270 kilometres northwest of Saskatoon.

The duo is now conducting a search of the area to collect some of the estimated thousands of meteorite fragments densely strewn over an estimated 20-square-kilometre area.

Arizona’s Robert Haag, who operates the websites http://www.meteorites.com and http://www.meteoriteman.com, has made a living for the past 30 years buying and selling meteorites and other space debris.

The famous asteroid hunter has offered a $10,000 reward to anyone who can find a one-kilogram chunk of the meteorite, and says he’ll come to Saskatchewan once the first piece is located.

Witnesses from across Saskatchewan and Alberta saw the fireball on Nov. 20 in a brief but spectacular display.

The property where the meteorite fragments were found belongs to rancher Ian Mitchell. He didn’t see the fireball in the sky on Nov. 20, but planned to go hunting for space rocks after he heard the meteor may have exploded into thousands of pieces in the region.

Now that he knows he has meteorites, he isn’t sure what to do with them. They belong to the owners of the land on which they fall.

Scientists hope to find much larger pieces, and Mitchell said he might sell those if people are willing to pay. Smaller fragments probably will be donated to universities and research groups, he said.