Meteorite gallery

Bondoc meteorite from the American Meteorite Laboratory

Bondoc meteorite formerly from the H. H. Nininger Collection, rare memento of a unique meteorite recovery (31.4 grams, TC10.2).

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Bondoc
Mesosiderite (B4)
Found in 1956, recognized in 1959
Bondoc Peninsula, Luzon Island, Philippines

In 1959, Harvey H. Nininger, while visiting the National Bureau of Mines in the Philippines, was shown a rusty lump of metallic nature. The sample had been brought in by a prospector as evidence that he had found an iron deposit. However, once the deposit, located in the middle of the Filipino jungle, had been recognized as being of meteoritic origin, the mining project was abandoned and the main mass of the Bondoc meteorite forgotten. A few years after this visit, Nininger's correspondent, John A. Lednicky, relocated the rock and sent him some samples. Nininger recognized that the meteorite was of a very rare type and thus decided to extract the Bondoc meteorite from the remote jungle at any price (Nininger, 1972).

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- Bondoc Meteorite Cut fragment from the American Meteorite Laboratory, with hand-painted Nininger number (2)684.273 and AML label. Bondoc specimens with Nininger number are rare mementos of a unique meteorite recovery: 'The last phase of the recovery was rather risky and gave us some worried moments. The day we got it on the bamboo raft for the trip down the river and across the stretch of sea, a typhoon showed up [...]. As we got near the coast of Mulanay one boat sank and we almost lost four men trying to keep the raft from collapsing...', John A. Lednicky, in Nininger (1972).
  31.4 grams
  TC10.2