Morocco Adds Two New Meteorite Falls to International Registry, Totaling 20

The Nomenclature Committee (NomCom) of the Meteoritical Society officially published, on May 9, the declarations of two meteorite falls in Morocco. These are "Wad Lahteyba" and "Al Farciya". A team of researchers from the University Hassan II of Casablanca, led by Prof. Hasnaa Chennaoui, also a member of the NomCom, carried out the classifications and the scientific work.

Several eyewitnesses from the southern provinces of Morocco had observed, on Thursday, June 27, 2019 at 5:00 p.m. (GMT+1), a luminous trail of yellow to red color for a few seconds. It was moving from southwest to northeast, without explosion. This discovery had aroused the curiosity of several meteorite hunters who had traveled to the potential site of the fall to search for pieces. They will find the first pieces of the meteorite, two days later, and will call this fall "Lahmada".

Still in the same Lahmada Lbayda region, not far from Lmahbas, several residents of the surroundings saw, on Tuesday, August 20, 2019 at 1:15 a.m. (GMT+1), another meteor. According to eyewitnesses, it was a red fireball crossing the clouds, followed by two explosions. The direction of the bolide was from north to south. The search began in the morning. In charge, a group of meteorite hunters. The latter collected the first pieces in the evening, and called this fall "Khdim Chham".

Researchers from the GAIA laboratory, University Hassan II of Casablanca, Faculty of Sciences Ain Chock, in partnership with an American laboratory (Institute of Meteoritics, The University of New Mexico, USA) and with the help of Moroccan meteorite hunters, the Moroccan Association of Meteorites and the Attarik Foundation for Meteoritics and Planetary Science have studied these two falls now recognized internationally.