In the world The most famous meteorite show, in Ensishim in France, I noticed that there were many dealers from Morocco. Unlike most Europeans and Americans – those who had performance cases and labels and books – Morocco stalls were minimal. Perhaps a white sheet covered with lumps of red-brown rocks. A pair of scales. Sometimes a piece of paper with per kg prices written in biro. It only returned to England which I learned about Saharan Gold Rush.
Since 1999, the number of meteorites found in Morocco has exploded. The officially recognized number is more than one thousand – although it is described by scientists as “a gross understanding”. For comparison, the UK has only 23 falls and finds.
“You must talk to Hasan,” a dealer, Darryl Pitt wrote me. “He has tried – and somewhat succeeded – the North African meteorite changed the chaos of trade in some more systematic ways.” This was not the first time his name came up.
Hasna Chenoui Oudzen, a professor at Hassan II University, Casablanca, is used as an outsider in the room. In meetings of Meteorite The committee, for naming meteorite, the group officially worked with the naming of recognized meteorites, when she was a member, “unique representative of any Arab or Muslim country.” (She remains an advisor for the committee.) When I instigated the topic of export of Morocco, she groaned. “The position with the meteorites of Morocco is crazy,” she says. “It is immoral.”
At the end of the last century several factors combined Morocco to create a meteorite warm place. First, climate and geography. Allowing for the difference in the total surface area, a meteorite is likely to land as a support in Scotland's highlands, but in the past it will be very difficult to find – Heather, rocks – and “terrestrial” will “” very quickly – rain, Mud, ice. Most (although not all), meteorites reach the earth with dark fusion crust exteriors.
Secondly, Morocco already had a network of western fossils, minerals and archaeological hunters and dealers, while many people from Morocco were highly skilled in search. Rocks And artifacts in the desert. When I went with my flock, I looked at the ground, “a nomad explained to a journalist of the Middle East. He said that the stone business had saved many nomadic families from poverty.
Third, the legal and geopolitical situation of Morocco helped with things. “We are, thank God, a peaceful country,” Chenoui says. “It is something unique in the region.” Here it (relatively) is safe that we want to wander the Saharan sands in search of stones. In addition, there was no dedicated regulation of the country's meteorites. If you found a meteorite in Morocco, perhaps it was to do it with you as you like.
American dealer Michael Gilmar started Saharan Gold Rush in the mid -1990s. Foreign dealers quickly discovered that unclapsed meteorites could be purchased from Morocco traders at very low prices, formally analyzed in the west, and sold for considerable profit.
The city of Erfoud in the southeastern Drâa-Tafilalet region of Morocco, known as “The Gateway to the Sahara”, became a center for those expecting meteorites to earn money from meteorites. A visitor will find shops that sell meteorite and fossils, with some small ad hoc museums. Some nomads have diversified tourists and collectors to take out the desert to search for stones.