QUE94201 Petrographic Description

Antarctic Meteorite Newsletter, Volume 18, Number 2
August 1995

Sample No.:	QUE94201
Location:	Queen Alexandra Range
Dimensions (cm):	2.3 x 2.0 x 1.5 cm
Weight (g):	12.0
Meteorite Type:	Shergottite

Macroscopic Description: Roberta Score
This small, dark-gray to black stone is rounded and polished. The spotty, brownish-black, remnant fusion crust is difficult to distinguish from the melted, glassy grains on the exterior surface. The interior is coarse-grained, crystalline, and glassy. It is composed of laths or globular grains of transparent or translucent maskelynite plus dull or glassy-black pyroxene. Several mafic-rich areas, as large as 5 x 4 mm, were noted. Oxidation is scattered throughout the interior. Thick evaporite minerals are concentrated as small blebs.

Thin Section (,3) Description: Brian Mason
The section shows a coarse-grained aggregate of subequal amounts of pyroxene and maskelynite; the maskelynite as laths up to 3.6 mm long, and the pyroxene as interstitial anhedral to subhedral grains. Maskelynite is fairly uniform in composition, An_55-64. The pyroxene is pigeonite of variable composition, Wo_9-20 and Fs_21-69. The meteorite is a shergottite.