NO. 5 HEXAHEDRITES — HENDERSON 37 



published analyses, or upon an interpretation of pictures showing the 

 metallography of the meteorites. When a seemingly reliable analysis 

 reported more than 6 percent nickel, or when a picture showed either 

 plessite or taenite in abundance, the meteorite was no longer con- 

 sidered to be a hexahedrite. If neither a picture nor an analysis of the 

 iron was available, the Prior-Hey classification or the original descrip- 

 tion was accepted. 



Obviously the hexahedrites are not scattered at random over the 

 world. Unfortunately, at this time we do not know how other types 

 of meteorites are distributed. Formerly it was assumed that a shower 

 of iron meteorites would scatter like the stony ones. However, the 

 evidence here presented suggests that hexahedrites have a different 

 fallout pattern from that of stony meteorites, but for reasons not yet 

 known. 



Because the four hexahedrites located in Canada and our adjacent 

 northern States are so widely separated that they do not make a 

 convincing case for a meteorite shower, they were not counted. Table 

 16 gives the number of hexahedrites in each of the areas where 

 evidence exists that a shower of hexahedrites occurred. The hexa- 

 hedrites from Chile, southeastern United States, Europe, two places 

 in Africa, and Argentina seem to be geographically grouped in a 

 fallout pattern. 



Table 16 shows the numbers of hexahedrites which, by grouping, 



Table 16. — The numbers of hexahedrites from the different geographic areas 



zvhich may be related. 



1 Mexico-Texas, Oklahoma 6 



2 Southeastern U. S 18 



3 Chile 12 



4 Australia 5 



5 Europe 5 



6 Africa 4 



Total 50 



Witnessed falls (excluding the Nedagolla ^) 6 



Number accounted for as possible falls 56, or 80 percent 



Hexahedrites scattered at random 14, or 20 percent 



1 See page 8. 



appear to have fallen in showers. If, to these 50 cases, the 6 which 

 were seen to fall are added, we have 56 hexahedrites out of a total of 

 70. This means that approximately 80 percent of these irons either 



