Cranfield Meteorite Commemorative Coin

Description

Coins have a long history as a collectible, one far older than that of meteorites. Stories of the famed emperor Augustus collecting and gifting old and foreign coins appear in Suetonius’s De vita Caesarum, which was published in 121 AD. Modern coin collecting centers around a variety of approaches, including historical, artistic, topical, and economic. 

In 2004, Liberia made history as the first country to authorize the issue of a legal tender coin; a silver coin embedded with a piece of the NWA 267 meteorite. Multiple countries have followed suit, and meteorite collectors can now also add artistic commemorative coins, such as this, to their collections. 

An affordable alternative to silver coins, this coin depicting the Cranfield road sign is made of stainless steel.  

Cranfield
31°33’06.1″N, 91°11’36.6″W
Mississippi, United States
Confirmed fall: 2022 Apr 27
Classification: Ordinary chondrite (H3-5)

History: (M. Fries): On April 27, 2022, at 8:03 a.m. CDT (1303 GMT) multiple eyewitnesses from Arkansas, Louisiana, and Mississippi reported a bolide and sonic booms (AMS Event 2022-2591). Doppler radar data revealed falling meteorites approximately 24 km east of the city of Natchez, Mississippi. The radar reflectivity data overlay rolling hills of dense woodland interspersed with open flat residential areas. Dark-flight modeling suggested meteorites landed both north and south of the divided four-lane U.S. Hwy 84E, next to the sparsely populated subdivision called Cranfield. On April 30, 202,2 Linda Welzenbach Fries and Marc Fries recovered the first two meteorites N1 (41.31 g) and N2 (37.65 g), within the center of the calculated strewn field, 16.9 km east of Natchez, on the shoulder (31°33’06.1″N 91°11’36.6″W) and median (31°33’08.9″N 91°11’25.9″W) of U.S. Hwy 84E. The first stone (N1) remains with the finders. The second stone (N2) is subdivided to provide the required deposit material. Both stones were collected cleanly and prior to rain. On May 1st at around 9:07 a.m. Matthew Stream and Roberto Vargas discovered a meteorite that had hit U.S. Hwy 98/84E (31.550129° -91.206338°, WGS84). This stone is estimated at approximately 250 g in total mass, but is broken into many pieces, recovered over two days. Two pieces from this stone were donated to Cascadia for thin section preparation.