[meteorite-list] A New Question

Tue May 13 18:53:37 EDT 2008

"Does anyone know What is the reasoning behind the ban?"

Hi David,

There is no "ban".  Interested collectors from many nations have been 
obviously stocking up collections for years with Antarctic meteorites.

Anyone (including commercial tour operators) can put together a 
scientific plan for collecting Antarctic meteorites - at your co$$$t- 
and apply for a permit.  You cannot b denied the permit in your 
jurisdiction as long as you can make convincing guarantees as judged by 
administrators that you can provide at your cost, the required 
scientific care in collecting, curating and furnishing the meteorites 
basically free, to bonafide researchers for scientific studies, with 
the caveat that if any time during the perpetuity that follows you can 
no longer do this, you must transfer everything to an entity that 
properly can.

The reason is simple, the Antarctic is a scientific preserve where the 
natural resources are protected, like, say, the Old Faithful Geyser in 
Yellowstone Park.  If someone decided to drill out and cap the geyser 
and pipe out the hot water for commercial use, how would that play on 
your sense of morality?  I think it would bother me...  The scientific 
preserve creation is a lucky windfall for environmentalists.  The real 
motivation behind this government collaboration is the worry that 
brazen nations (and there is never a shortage of these) might abuse 
this "no-man's land" while other "well behaved nations" stood by and 
got jealous, disadvantaged, or had their security threatened.  So the 
countries agreed that military, disposal or commercial (i.e., mining, 
harvesting flora or fauna) acivities by any treaty signatories was 
mutually prohibited.

This is the "ban" you mention, no commercial meteorite hunters may 
apply unless they plan on shouldering all the trip and collection 
expenses by themselves and then giving away the meteorites to qualified 
scientific interests only under the perpetually self-financed curating 
scheme already mentioned.  If this non-commercial ban were not in 
effect, anyone could go to this frozen paradise and dump toxic wastes, 
drill for oil and leave their holes uncovered, tear down the mountains 
to make cement, colonize the place ignoring the unclear set of prior 
claims of souvreinty (which others put on hold with promises that no 
one else could ever jump their claim) and put explosive mines and guns 
pointed everywhere (like big boy nations do anyway with their floating 
and flying fleets on our polluted deep oceans).  So politicians sided 
with Greenpeace once this past millenia and decided that making it a 
place to observe but not disturb was the only way to go.

Today, Antarctica is a pristine, white, wonderland, teaming with a 
unique spectrum of life, a veritable fantasyland but for real, a 
fragile window into an environment that is just as much Earth as the 
Amazon jungle - which very few will every have the opportunity to 
admire in person, unless they seriously take up a career in the 
sciences and make contributions to society from studues there.  It is 
not a live battlefield subject where children are forced to work the 
mines for $0.25 per day without medical care for all the fingers and 
toes lost to frostbite, just so we can buy disposible containers with 
Coca Cola's lithographed logotype.

I don't know, but I would think it is not impossible to get meteorites 
 from permitted curating institutions in trades for special material 
with perfect provenance traced back to its orientation on the ice.  
However, good luck trading as I don't think anyone wants to have to 
justify to administrators who always manage to attack with hindsight - 
why they made a dumb trade of material that has been cataloged and 
never unfrozen, and acts as a control as well as a variable, since the 
day it was found.  Had Tagish Lake happened in Alaska and collecting 
been done like a space mission by private individuals, we could put the 
concept to a real test.

Put another way, the parties realized there is no such thing as putting 
it half-way in and not making other suitors jealous.

Best wishes
Doug
P.S. This is the only place I know where governments consider costs to 
be incremental costs (and don't even give you credit for your meteorite 
scale cube or double baggies).  Everywhere else governments seem to 
have a concept of cost that includes all the fat that they produce.  
Ah...human governance...

PPS The Antarctic is but a coming attraction of what is to come in 
Space... Probably it will be immoral to mine an asteroid in the 
"Federation National Parks of the Asteroid Belt" at some point ...

-----Original Message-----
From: David & Kitt Deyarmin <bobadebt at ec.rr.com>
To: meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com
Sent: Tue, 13 May 2008 5:04 pm
Subject: [meteorite-list] A New Question

Does anyone know What is the reasoning behind the ban? 

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A specific pre-treaty date is unclear. Some of the material that was 
released into the market and that are considered 'pre-treaty':  
Adelie Land ALHA 76001 ALHA 76003 ALHA 76005 ALHA 76006 ALHA 76008 ALHA 
76009 Mount Baldr Thiel Mtns Lazarev Derrick Peak 78008 Neptune 
Mountains  
Most are next to impossible to get with the exception of ALHA 76009, 
which is readily available. Thiel Mountains is out there, but expect to 
pay $300-400/g for it. Lazarev was a Rob Elliot exclusive and will 
probably never be available again unless a collector sells their own.  
A tidbit of info is here:  
http://astro-artifacts.com/Astroartifacts/AA_Antarctic_Meteorites.html  
Kind regards,   Mike Bandli www.Astro-Artifacts.com   
-------------------------------------------------------------------------

-----Original Message----- From: meteorite-list-bounces at 
meteoritecentral.com [mailto:meteorite-list-bounces at 
meteoritecentral.com] On Behalf Of Pete Shugar Sent: Monday, May 12, 
2008 7:52 PM To: Meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com Subject: 
[meteorite-list] A New Question  
When was the treaty banning the release of meteorites from Antarctica 
to collectors placed into effect? How many meteorites excaped before 
the ban? What are their names? Thanks in advance, Pete 
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