First, what’s the difference between a meteor and a meteorite? Meteors or “shooting stars” are anything from dust to larger objects from space that streak through sky without hitting the ground. Meteors heat up as they pass through the atmosphere and create the light that you see as they shoot by. They either burn up or fly by into space again.

Meteorites are large enough and on the right trajectory to make it to the ground. If you think you found a meteorite, it’s possible, but since meteors never reach Earth, you will never find a meteor. Unless you are in space of course.

With that said, How do you know if you have a meteorite? The answer is not simple, but here is a couple of questions to ask yourself:

Is it black or brown and fairly smooth, without holes on the outside?

Is it solid and compact? (not porous)

Is it heavy compared to an average rock of the same size?

Is it attracted by a magnet?

Is it made of metal or does it show metallic iron specks on a broken, cut, or polished surface?

If you answer “yes” to all of the above questions, the object may be a meteorite. If most or all of the answers are “no”, the object is most likely not a meteorite. 

Another test is the Streak Test.

Some rocks can be misleading, like hematite and magnetite. Each mineral leaves a characteristic colored streak when scraped along the unglazed surface of a ceramic tile or coffee mug. Hematite leaves a red-brown streak and magnetite leaves a gray-black streak. Meteorites will not leave a streak unless they are highly weathered. (but weathered ones can leave a brown streak)

Tektites are sometimes mistaken for meteorites. See “What is a Tektite”

One of the hardest types of meteorites to identify are the “Stoney” type. They ironically are the most abundant. They are similar to Earth rock, but are usually heavier. The most outstanding feature is a melted exterior called a “fusion crust”. This is usually a thin black melted coating on the outside. This crust can sometimes be brown from rusted iron content.

Iron type meteorites are more rare to find and are made almost entirely of nickel-iron. These meteorites will be black or brown on the outside. They will be very heavy and a magnet will stick strongly to them. If you file or grind on them they will show metal like any other piece of iron that is rusted. Because of this they can easily be confussed with old junk that has been rusting for a long time.

Iron meteorites come in all shapes and sizes. They commonly have “regmaglyphs” -depressions resembling thumb prints on the outside.

Stoney-Iron Meteorites are a somewhere in the middle between stoney and iron types as the name suggests. They are heavy because of the iron content and usually rusted on the surface. They are often confused with slag from furnaces.

If it still looks like you may have a meteorite, you may want to get a professional to look at it or a piece of it. .

Iron Meteorite

Stoney Meteorite

Tektite comes from Greek tektos, meaning molten. Tektites are natural glass objects that scientists believe are formed by the impact of large meteorites. They are typically black or olive green with shapes varying from round to irregular.

Tektites are some of the “driest” rocks, with an average water content of 0.005%. This is highly unusual, because most if not all of the craters where tektites may have formed were underwater before impact. Partially melted zircons have sometimes been discovered inside tektites. This, along with the water content, suggests that the tektites were formed under temperatures and pressures not normally found on the surface of the Earth.

The impact theory states that a meteorite impact melts material from the Earth’s surface and catapults it up to several hundred kilometers away from the impact site. The molten material cools and solidifies to glass. as determined from isotopic measurements, a meteorite impact causes their formation, but the precursor material of tektites is primarily of terrestrial origin. Today, the terrestrial origin of tektites is widely accepted based on the results of many geochemical and isotopic studies (e.g. Faul H.(1966), Koeberl C.(1990)).

The theory also relies on the observation that tektites cannot be found everywhere on Earth’s surface. They are only found in four strewnfields associated with known impact craters. Only the largest and geologically youngest tektite deposit in Southeast Asia, called the Australasian strewnfield, has not been definitively linked to an impact site, probably because even very large impact structures are often not easy to detect. For example, one of the largest known impact sites in the U.S. the Chesapeake Bay impact crater, was not detected until the early 1990s since it is covered by sediments. The bigger the strewnfield, the bigger the area to search for the crater. Since several new craters are identified every year, this is not really regarded as a problem by proponents of the tektite impact theory, except for the expected Australasian crater, a feature that would be less than a million years old and thus easily visible. This crater, if it exists at all, has not been located.

Moldavites are a type of tektite found in Czech Republic.

Tektites are sometimes called by other names, depending on the part of the world and their characteristics. Below are some types of Tektites.

European strewnfield -Nördlinger Ries, Germany

Moldavites -Czech Republic, green

Australasian strewnfield -no associated crater identified; but see Wilkes Land crater

Australites -Australia, dark, mostly black

Indochinites -South East Asia, dark, mostly black

Chinites -China, black

North American strewnfield -Chesapeake Bay impact crater, USA

Bediasites -USA, Texas, black

Georgiaites -USA, Georgia, green

Ivory Coast strewnfield -Lake Bosumtwi Crater, Ghana

Ivorites -Ivory Coast, black