Early in evening of December 15, 2022, a bright fireball lit up the fading sky over the remote desert of Niger in the Sahara. A couple of weeks later, locals in the area near the town of Arlit went looking and found an apparent strewnfield of fresh stones.
Here is where the story gets a little strange. For the Meteoritical Society (MetSoc) to accept the validity of a witnessed fall event, there must be a firm fall location that is documented via GPS or some other scientifically-acceptable form of evidence. If any part of the fall sequence is unwitnessed or the veracity of some part of the account is in question, MetSoc may choose to officially classify the meteorite as a "find" or a "possible/probable" fall instead of a true witnessed fall.
In the case of this fall, MetSoc elected to publish it as a "find, possible fall" and it was given the name Taoussat-n-Amouzzour 001. This new name is also a Dense Collection Area (DCA) which means that other meteorites have been found in the area and a numbering system is used to catalog them. A well-known example of this is the NWA-xxxxx series of meteorites that every collector has heard of.
The strange part is, this meteorite is the first (TnA 001) in this new DCA and there must be some kind of solid fall location data for it to be accurately placed within this dense collection area and given a number. Yet, this location data must not be solid enough to authoritatively classify it as a true fall. This speaks to the stringent standards MetSoc uses when evaluating fall reports.
At any rate, this is a very fresh meteorite that in all likelihood is a witnessed fall. The locals near Arlit Niger certainly think so. Samples were eventually classified at the University of Washington as a L3 chondrite that is W0/1 and S1 for weathering and shock.
The specimens offered here are small fragments that were collected during cutting.
Refer to the photo. The black centimeter cube is shown for scale and is not included. You are purchasing a small fragment like the one shown. Your purchase will include a labeled gemjar for safe storage.
From the Meteoritical Bulletin entry on Taoussat-n-Amouzzour 001:
Taoussat-n-Amouzzour 001 (TnA 001) 17.27508, 8.37378
Agadez, Niger
Find, possible fall: 2022 Dec 15
Classification: Ordinary chondrite (L3)
History: On December 15, 2022, at around 7 p.m. local people at wadi Amdriga and the village of Tafragah, Niger observed a fireball east of Arlit. Several days later, many fresh, partially to completely crusted stones were found together by shepherds near a dry river bed west of Massif de Taghouaji at 17°16’30.288"N, 8°22’25.606"E. In March, 2023 Marcin Cimala purchased 5250 g and Ziyao Wang 1133 g of the material.
Physical characteristics: All rocks show a fresh grayish interior with recognizable chondrules and are partly to completely covered with black fusion crust.
Petrography: The meteorite shows a chondritic texture with well-defined, mostly rounded, and packed chondrules (mean diameter: 586±290 µm, n=97) in a fine-grained dark grayish matrix that contains sulfides and FeNi metal.
Geochemistry: olivine: Fa15.4±10.2 (Fa0.6-33.2, n=24); Cr2O3 in ferroan olivine 0.03±0.02 wt%, n=40; low Ca-pyroxene: Fs11.0±8.2Wo0.6±0.2 (Fs0.9-23.6Wo0.2-1.1, n=24).
Classification: Ordinary chondrite (L3). L chondrite class is consistent with the measured magnetic susceptibility. Chromium contents in ferroan olivine indicate a subtype ~3.2.
