[meteorite-list] Apollo astronauts trained to NOT pick up meteorites on moon

[EKGMARS at aol.com]

     Regarding the discussions about picking up meteorites on the moon.   The 
Apollo astronauts were specifically trained by NASA to NOT pick up meteorites 
on the moon.   The classes were taught by Prof. Carleton Moore of the Center 
for Meteorite Studies, Arizona State University and Don Elston of the USGS in 
Flagstaff, AZ.   It was felt that because the astronaut's time on the moon was 
so limited and the mass of material that could be returned from the moon also 
limited, it would be better to leave any "discovered" meteorites on the moon. 
   I was a student of Carleton Moore during the time he taught the classes to 
the astronauts.    I still have one of the briefing packages on meteorites 
given to the Apollo astronauts.
     However, Ursula Marvin of the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, 
Cambridge, MA, did find a meteorite fragment in one of the soils she examined.   
That discovery is published in the early Proceedings of the Lunar and 
Planetary Science Conference (Second or Third Conf. Proceedings).

Everett Gibson
ekgmars at aol.com
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://six.pairlist.net/mailman/private/meteorite-list/attachments/20060901/97df7f39/attachment.html>