Have you ever wondered what a meteorite looks like?
Our curiosity will now be answered as the National Museum of Natural History officially opened the public display of “Orconuma: A Piece of Space.”
Orconuma Meteorite is one of the six meteorites from the Philippines listed in the Bulletin Database of the Meteoritical Society. Classified as an H3-4 chondrite, this space rock is one of the first solid materials to form from the earliest days of the social system–about 4.6 billion years ago.
The donated specimen that you will see at the museum is a slice weighing 160.17 grams and has a dimension of 149x108x3 mm. It is the portion of the 7.8 kg of meteorite that fell on March 7, 2011 in Orconuma, Bongabong, Oriental Mindoro, hence, where the name came from. This important piece from space was found in the field by three famers namely Fredo Manzano, Edgar Francisco Sr., and Enrico Camacho Jr.
This meteorite was later on acquired by John Higgins and Jasper Spencer—respected meteorite collectors, who later on donated a piece to the National Museum.
But, you might ask, how can one be sure that a rock is a meteorite? Christian Cruz, MGB IV-A Science Research Specialist II (Embedded Technical Personnel of the Community Environment and Natural Resources Office of Catanauan, Quezon) tells MB Life that we can not simply rely on the appearance of the stone, and there are studies need to be conducted in order to verify that a piece is actually a meteorite.
As for the Philippines, we don’t have a facility yet to do the testing and studies..
“As of now, we don’t have a facility yet that can do this test,” he says. “There’s a geologist that will classify the specific meteorite.”
“Orconuma: A Piece of Space” show is located at the Godofredo Alcasid Function Hall on the ground floor of National Museum of Natural History of the Philippines Complex in Rizal Park, City of Manila.
