Norton County
Seen to fall in 1948 in the United States · 1.1 tonnes recovered · Aubrite
Norton County has the fourth-largest recovered mass of the 1,063 observed falls in NASA’s Meteorite Landings dataset (records to 2013). It is the heaviest of the 146 falls recorded in the United States, and of the nine Aubrite falls.
- Group
- Other achondrites
- Recorded position
- 39.683° N, 99.867° W
The map is centred on Norton County. Rings every 100 km; numbers match the table below.
Nearest recorded falls
The closest recorded fall to Norton County is Hoxie, 62 km to the south-west. Within 250 km lie five other recorded falls.
| # | Fall | Year | Class | Recovered | Distance |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Hoxie | 1963 | Ordinary chondrite | 266 g | 62 km south-west |
| 2 | Phillips County (stone) | 1901 | L6 | 58 kg | 63 km north-east |
| 3 | Beardsley | 1929 | H5 | 16 kg | 115 km west |
| 4 | Modoc (1905) | 1905 | L6 | 35 kg | 169 km south-west |
| 5 | Farmington | 1890 | L5 | 89 kg | 242 km east |
| 6 | Eagle | 1947 | EL6 | 10 kg | 313 km north-east |
What Aubrite means
Aubrite is the label for an aubrite, an enstatite-rich achondrite. Norton County is one of 19 other achondrites among the observed falls. The nearest other Aubrite fall is Peña Blanca Spring in the United States, 1,103 km away. In date order among Aubrite falls, the one before Norton County is Peña Blanca Spring (1946, the United States) and the one after is Mayo Belwa (1974, Nigeria).
Norton County in the United States’s record
In date order Norton County is number 103 of the 146 falls recorded in the United States, which run from 1807 to 2012. The fall recorded before Norton County in the United States is Eagle (1947); the next is Palolo Valley (1949).
The 1940s
Norton County is one of 55 falls dated to the 1940s. Elsewhere, the record lists two other falls in 1948: Uzcudun in Argentina, Mardan in Pakistan.