Appley Bridge meteorite, Wrightington, West Lancashire, Lancashire, England, UKi

Regional Level Types
Appley Bridge meteorite	Meteorite Fall Location
Wrightington	Civil Parish
West Lancashire	Borough
Lancashire	County
England	Constituent Country
UK	Country

Ordinary chondrite, veined (LL6, br; S2; W0)
Fell, 13 Oct 1914; 15 kg

During the evening a fireball appeared, detonations were heard, and the next day a meteoritic stone was recovered at Halliwell farm. Upon inspection the meteorite exhibits a recrystallized texture dominated by olivine, orthopyroxene, and lesser amounts of plagioclase. Relic chondrules, chondrule fragments, and metal grains are set within a fine-grained matrix. Opaques include Fe-Ni metal (including rare Co-rich wairauite), troilite with other sulfides, and chromite. Troilite is more abundant than Fe-Ni metal. Other phases are reported as well. Brecciation, veins, and undulatory extinction in olivine are consistent with moderate shock (S2), but some features may have been annealed so as to mask actual peak shock pressures which the meteoroid experienced during its preterrestrial eons. The reported cosmic ray exposure (CRE) age (1.2 Ma) is unusually short for chondritic meteorites. The short CRE age suggests relatively a recent disruption of a 'daughter' asteroid during the long journey between formation on an original asteroidal parent body, fragmental disruptions, and eventual earth impact for the Appley Bridge meteoroid.

Total iron (~20 wt%), olivine composition (Fa31), and oxygen isotopes indicate classification as an LL chondrite (very low bulk iron). LL chondrites are the smallest of the 3 major groups of ordinary chondrites with their 87 witnessed falls representing somewhat less than 10% of all recognized meteorite falls (early January 2016).

Some of the mass was apparently lost during events between impact and the institutional acquisition by scientists of 10.9 kg. However, the main mass has remained with the Museum of Natural History in London (8.69 kg in 2000).

Other Regions, Features and Areas containing this locality

References