Forget needles in a haystack, try to find a meteorite in a field. That’s the call from the Maine Mineral and Gem Museum in the small town of Bethel, which is offering $25,000 for the first one-kilogram specimen found in the meteorite that fell to Earth on April 8, 2023.
It’s the first observed by radar meteorite fell in Maine and arrived in Washington County around noon. Residents of eastern Maine and the Canadian province of New Brunswick reported seeing a trail of red in the sky that sounded like fireworks, with residents of the border town of Calais hearing multiple bangs sonic.
Map published by the NASA Meteor Falls website showing the dotted landing site at a scale of 10 kg (red) to 1 g (yellow). Photo: NASA.gov
The fact that it was visible in daylight led astronomers at the University of Maine to speculate that it was a larger type of meteor known as a racing cara fact that bolstered the confidence of the museum’s meteorite division.
The museum invited its Canadian neighbors to participate and asked participants to obtain permission from landowners before beginning research. He also noted that any discovery must be handed over for testing before a reward can be received.
“The Museum is able to test specimens for identification,” the museum wrote on Instagram. “Test results will be available in five to 10 business days and there is a cost due to sample preparation that is required for testing.”
The Maine Mineral and Gem Museum was founded by philanthropist Lawrence Stifler and his wife Mary McFadden and opened in late 2019. It prides itself on its world-class collection which it displays in a modern, cutting-edge way. In addition to thousands of minerals and gems, the museum has the largest Mars meteorite on Earth as well as the five largest pieces of the moon.
The American Meteor Society reported the Maine meteor as 2002 for the year 2023.
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