.34" Windowed Erg Chech 002 Meteorite (0.59 g)- Oldest Known Meteorite

This is a .34" wide (0.59 gram) windowed fragment of the Erg Chech 002 meteorite, found near the Erg Chech Sand Sea in southern Algeria in 2020. This meteorite displays some beautiful characteristics: it lacks fusion crust, but shows a nice contrast of coarse dark grains and occasional green pyroxenes set in a tan matrix.

This meteorite is an achrondirte because it is volcanic: thus, researchers suspect it is a fragment of crust from a chondritic protoplanet at least as old as the solar system itself. Though that protoplanet has likely been disitnegrated or metamorphosed, bits of it still remain in the solar system. This makes Erg Chech 002 perhaps the oldest volcanic rock known to man!

This specimen comes in its own acrylic display case.