Note that the number in brackets in the auction title is simply our personal inventory number for this auction


Combining lots to save on postage would be fine. 

* NWA METEORITE *

CUT SPECIMEN WEIGHS 4.5 GRAMS

In the late 1990s the Nomads in the Sahara learned how to identify meteorites and also that they could be sold and they could make lots of money. Until then meteorites were almost always sold classified (And very expensive) but now thousands of meteorites (Many tonnes) were being sold on the market all mixed together with no pattern or order. The meteoritical society (Run by a bunch of scientists interested in meteorites and organized by the university of Arizona) was trying to decide what to do to organize all these loose meteorites that never had location data on where they were found. As one of the worlds largest meteorite dealers they asked me my thoughts (I assume they asked most of the dealers selling those new desert meteorites). What they finally decided was to just give them the name NWA (Short for North West Africa - where the markets where they were mostly being sold were located) and just give them a number name (Like my NWA16123 that I also currently have specimens listed on ebay.

This meteorite is the very first one of these desert meteorites that got classified and reported. This was bought in Morocco by the late meteorite dealer Michael Casper. I bought (If I remember correctly) a hundred kilos of meteorites from him and singled this one out and sent it to Dr Alan Rubin at UCLA to classify and it became the infamous NWA001. This would make it an historical meteorite. NWAs changed the meteorite world making meteorites affordable for anybody to buy. This is the meteorite that started it all. NWA001

WHAT IS A NWA METEORITE?

Meteorites are named after where they fell or were found. So if a meteorite fell near the town of Zagami Nigeria its name is Zagami. if it fell near Ensisheim Germany its name is Ensisheim and if you buy a piece of that meteorite you buy it using that name. Usually this naming system works well but over the past decade or so people have discovered you can find meteorites relatively easy in deserts. This includes poor Sahara desert nomads used to earning $200 a year who now all of a sudden can get tens of thousands of dollars for a good meteorite find. So it seems that pretty much everybody who lives in the Sahara are on the lookout for meteorites. Worthless weathering away rocks strewn throughout the desert is now being saved for the world because crazy foreigners like me will pay good money for these stones.

But you don't know where the nomads found these meteorites - so you cant give them a place name. Just from  somewhere in the desert which stretches for thousands of miles. But buyers and sellers congregate in Morocco and that's where the meteorites changes hands. That is in North western Africa (Or NWA for short). Since there are thousands of meteorites the very first NWA meteorite was named NWA001 (Which incidentally NWA001 is a number from one of my meteorites - so I have been involved in NWA meteorites for quite a while). The next meteorite is named NWA002 ect up to how ever high the numbers will go - or until the 40,000 years of meteorite falls get hunted out.  

 Start or add to your meteorite collection now while prices are really low.