NORTHWEST AFRICA 060

A single 604 g stone was purchased in a market in Erfoud, Morocco by American collectors in August 2000. Black fusion crust still covers the portion of the meteorite that was exposed above the desert sands, while the buried portion is encrusted with desert caliche. The meteorite was classified by Alan Rubin at UCLA as a rare CK5. Typical of CK chondrites, NWA 060 contains ~75 vol% matrix, 15 vol% chondrules, and 0.5 vol% CAIs (Huber et al., 2006). A few vol% of magnetite is present as grains in matrix, as curvilinear trails inside silicates, and as components of small nodules. Minor sulfides, primarily pentlandite and pyrite, also occur.

A weathering index (wi) was developed by Rubin and Huber (2005) for the oxidized meteorites such as those of the R chondrite and CK chondrite groups. This index is based on the modal abundance of brown-stained silicates as visually determined on a thin section in transmitted light at ~100× magnification; NWA 060 was determined to have an index of wi-5, or severely weathered. Besides NWA 060, other CK5 chondrites that have been found outside Antarctica include the 946 g DaG 412 and the 476 g NWA 1907.

More detailed petrological and mineralogical information about the CK group and its relationship to the CV group, as well as a new proposed taxonomic designation, can be found on the Dhofar 015 page. The photo above shows a 0.7 g partial slice of NWA 060, while that below shows the complete mass as found.