316 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 193 3 



resent the dent made by the meteorite. Reinvaldt supposes that the 

 craters were formed by violent steam explosions, steam being sud- 

 denly generated from the ground water in the rocks by the heat of 

 impact of the meteorites, and that the meteoric iron was shot out 

 from the craters together with rock fragments. There are indica- 

 tions of other small craters that have been filled with stones col- 

 lected from the land. A mantle of glacial deposits about a meter in 

 thickness covers the ground. This in intermingled with the rock 

 debris of the craters, proving that the craters are postglacial. 



No meteoritic material has been found at this locality. The ab- 

 sence of masses of iron is explained by the fact that the ground has 

 been tilled since time immemorial." But pieces of iron shale should 

 have been found in the excavations in the rims of the craters. Silica 

 glass would, of course, not be found, as the surrounding rock is 

 dolomite. 



The SibeHan craters (fig. 1, pis. 4 and 5) are rather disappointing, 

 showing only as a series of small pools in a swamp. It is certain that 

 some catastrophic event occurred there on June 30, 1908, but its exact 

 nature still remains doubtful. Unfortunately no good and connected 

 account has yet been given, but sensational reports appear period- 

 ically in the newspapers. The best account, collected from the avail- 

 able scraps of information, is that recently given by Dr. Whipple.^* 

 Only after a lapse of several years, in 1921, were inquiries made in 

 the neighborhood of Kansk by Dr. Leonid A. Kulik, who is curator 

 of the meteorite department in the Mineralogical Museum of the 

 Academy of Sciences at Leningrad. A fireball had been seen and 

 loud explosions heard over a wide area, blasts of hot air were felt, 

 and an earthquake recorded at Kansk and Irkutsk, as well as at 

 Tashkent, Tiflis, and Jena. Air waves had also been recorded on 

 the microbarographs at Cambridge, London, Reading, and Peters- 

 field in England, though they were not deciphered until 1930 by Dr. 

 Whipple. Then it was remembered that remarkable midnight glows 

 and twilight had been seen in Europe and Siberia on June 30, 1908, 

 and the following nights. Mention of a " meteorite " [i.e., meteor, 

 for no meteorite has even yet been found] was made by Dr. Kulik 

 and others.^^ 



" A similar explanation is given for the absence of meteoric iron in India (as contrasted 

 with the United States of America and Australia). Of the 106 recorded Indian meteorites 

 only 1 is a found iron. 



" Whipple, F. J. W., The great Siberian meteor and the waves, seismic and aerial, which 

 it produeod. Quart. Juuru. Roy. Meteorol. Soc. vol. 56. pp. 287-304, 4 fiss., 19.'50. 



" Tscbinvinsky, P., Meteorit vom 30. Juni 1908 im' Ausflussgebiet der Fliisse Tunguska 

 ni Sibirien. Centralblatt Min., p. 550, 1923. 



Voznesensky, A. V., Fall of a meteorite on 30 June 1908 in the upper course of the 

 Khatanga River [Russian]. Mirov^d^ni^, Bull. Soc. Russ. des Amis de I'fitude de 

 rUnlvers, vol. 14, pp. 25-38, with small sketch map, 1925. 



Obruchev, S. V., On the place of the fall of the great Khatanga meteorite In 1908 

 [Russian]. Ibid., pp. 38-40, with small sketch map. 



