[meteorite-list] Introducing the Worlds Newest Meteorite fall -Creston

[Sean T. Murray]

Robert Ward is in the field in California, and asked me to pass this along 
to the list!  He recovered the first stone from the fall, and is continuing 
his expedition.

Make sure to click the link below to see the story, along with photos from 
Robert on his Website, robertwardmeteorites.com...

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On October 23, 2015, at 0547 UTC, a large fireball lit up the rolling hills 
of wine country east of Paso Robles.

The bolide stunned onlookers with a multitude of colors as it broke up into 
many pieces. The magnitude of the fall was so great that the spectacle was 
even observed several states away. Dozens of witnesses close to the ground 
path heard sonic booms shortly after the fireball terminated.

By the next day, the American Meteor Society had received over 120 reports. 
At first I was confused by what I saw in the data in the various AMS 
reports. As I sorted through a number of eye witness descriptions, it was 
soon clear that there were two events near to one another, both in distance 
and in time. I began working through the reports from the larger event 
individually, narrowing down the area to San Luis Obispo County. And 
focusing on eye witness reports in this area, I found one report in 
particular that caught my attention. The eye witness reported what sounded 
"like bombs falling," and that the meteor had passed directly overhead.

I contacted Marc Fries with the location and suggested the fall was probably 
within a few miles of the eye witnesses location. Within minutes, Marc found 
radar returns in the area that corresponded with the time of the event.

On October 27th, my wife Anne Marie and I arrived in the area under the 
returns Marc Fries had discovered. Within twenty minutes, we found a stone 
that had hit a metal fence post and shattered, showering the road embankment 
with fragments. We recovered 395.7 grams of material from the site and 
subsequently reassembled the majority of the stone.

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More here, with pictures:
http://robertwardmeteorites.com/creston-california/

We'll be posting more pictures, information and details on the expedition as 
the hunt progresses.

Sean Murray