Bhandari, N.

Gaur, V.

Shrivastava, K. L.

Shukla, A. D.

Swadia, J.

English

Publications of the IAS Fellows

SCIENTIFIC CORRESPONDENCE 
 
CURRENT SCIENCE, VOL. 89, NO. 5, 10 SEPTEMBER 2005 741
Iron meteorite fall at Bhuka village, Barmer district, Rajasthan 
 
A meteorite fragment weighing about 2.5 kg 
fell at Bhuka village, Barmer district, Raja-
sthan on 25 June 2005. We report here the
conditions of fall and preliminary descrip-
tion of this meteorite. The results of our 
study indicate that it is an iron meteorite. 
The meteorite has significant radioactivity 
of 54Mn and 57Co produced by cosmic rays,
indicating small ablation during its at-
mospheric transit. These results imply that 
the meteoroid was a small body (spatial 
dimension: 30–50 cm) in space. 
 The meteorite fragment was seen to fall 
at 23.08 h in Sindhion ki Dhani, Bhuka vil-
lage (25.41°N, 72°E), 15 km east of Sindhari 
on the Barmer–Balotara–Jodhpur road. The 
location of fall is shown in Figure 1. It fell 
in the farm of Mubeen, son of Ramdhan 
Sindhi. Mubeen being blind, could not 
observe the fall, but it was witnessed by 
his family members who saw a flash of light 
and loud cracking sound. The bright trail 
was seen as far as Jodhpur, some 110 km
north-east of Bhuka by several persons, 
including two of the authors (K.L.S. and 
J.S.). At Jodhpur, the meteor trail was seen 
moving towards southwest with a high 
zenith angle, estimated to be about 80° t  the
horizon. 
 The meteorite (Figure 2 a) is about 
10 cm ´  4 cm ´  4 cm in size and was handed 
over o the Police Department. A thorough 
search in the vicinity did not yield any 
more fragments, indicating that only a single 
fragment had fallen. The fragment made 
a 45 cm deep, 35 cm diameter crater in the 
sandy alluvium of the farm (Figure 2 b). 
 The meteorite has a thick black crust 
with occasional golden or brownish tinge, 
bei g frothy at places. The crust has well-
developed regmaglypts (thumb marks) typi-
cal of meteorites (Figure 2 a). A 6.46 g 
fragment from one corner of the meteorite 
was made available to us for this study. The 
meteorite is magnetic, having high den-
sity typical of iron. Observations with a 
magnifying lens indicate that it contains less 
than 2% silicate inclusions, randomly 
distributed in the metallic matrix (Figure 
2 c). Some white silicate inclusions were 
also observed in the interior cut face. Based 
on these observations the meteorite appears 
to belong to the iron group. More precise 
classification would require a study of 
characteristic trace elements. 
This fragment was counted on a low 
background, hyper pure germanium gamma 
ray spectrometer located in a 10 cm thick 
lead shield. The fragment shows significant 
activity due to radioactive 54Mn (0.084 
counts per minute (cpm)) and 57Co
(0.034 cpm), produced by cosmic ray inter-
actions in meteoritic iron and nickel. The 
activity is estimated to be about 304 ± 
18 dpm/kg of 54Mn and 38 ± 9 dpm/kg of 
57Co. Other radionuclides, e.g. 58Co,58Ni 
 
 
 
 
Figure 1. Location of fall of the Bhuka iron meteorite near Sindhari, Rajasthan. 
 
 
 
 
   
 
Figure 2. a, The 2.5 kg Bhuka meteorite showing regmaglypts on well-d veloped fusion crust. b, Crater (about 45 cm deep) and its ejecta produced 
by fall of the meteorite in sandy alluvium field. c, Fragment showing presence of white silicat  inclusions. 
c a b 
SCIENTIFIC CORRESPONDENCE 
 
CURRENT SCIENCE, VOL. 89, NO. 5, 10 SEPTEMBER 2005 742
and 60Co also expected to be produced in 
meteoritic iron and nickel were not obser-
ved, the signal from the small fragment pre-
sumably being below our detection limit. 
 The meteorite has fallen at the time of 
solar minimum when the cosmic ray flux 
in the interplanetary space is high. The high
activity of 54Mn and 57Co is consistent with 
the levels expected during solar minimum. 
The activity can be compared with the 
production profiles in meteoroids of differ-
ent sizes1,2, according to which maximum 
activity is produced at the centre of an 
iron meteorite of ~ 20 cm radius. The level 
of 54Mn present indicates that the ablation 
of the meteorite during its atmospheric 
transit has been small (< 20 cm) and the size 
of the meteoroid in space was between 
30 and 50 cm. 
 This is the seventh observed fall in the 
past 15 years in Rajasthan and the only iron
meteorite, the other six stony meteorites 
being Didwana (H5, 12 August 1991), Lo-
hawat (how, 30 October 1994), Devri Khera 
(L5/6, 30 October 1994), Piplia Kalan
(euc, 20 June 1996), Itawa Bhopji (L3/5, 
30th May 2000) and Bhawad (LL 6, 6 June 
2002). All these meteorites belong to differ-
ent classes and have different exposure 
ages (ranging betw en 8 and 110 Ma). Since 
only about 126 falls have been observed all 
over India in the past two centuries, this 
frequency of fall (one every two years) in 
a s all area of Rajasthan is anomalously 
high, as we have noted earlier3. In com-
parison, only eight falls have been reported 
from the rest of India during the past 15 
ye rs. The question whether this is a re-
gional or temporal statistical fluctuation 
or the Earth is going through an unusually 
d nse swarm of interplanetary bodies, is 
strengthened due to this additional fall. 
B tter awareness regarding meteorites 
may have also contributed to its efficient 
recovery in this desert area of India. 
 
 
1. Bhandari, N. et al., Geochim. Comochim. 
Acta, 1993, 57, 2361–2375. 
2. Leya, I. et al., Meteoritics Planet. Sci., 
2000, 35, 287–318. 
. Bhandari, N. et al., Meteoritics Planet. Sci., 
2002, 37, 549–563. 
 
Received 8 July 2005; revised accepted 27 
July 2005 
 
 
K. L. SHRIVASTAVA1 
V. GAUR1 
J. SWADIA1 
N. BHANDARI2,* 
A. D. SHUKLA3 
 
1Department of Geology, 
J.N.V. University, 
Jodhpur 342 005, India 
2Basic Sciences Research Institute, 
Navrangpura, 
Ahmedabad 380 009, India 
3Physical Research Laboratory, 
Navrangpura, 
Ahmedabad 380 009, India 
*For correspondence. 
e-mail: bhandari@prl.ernet.in 
 
 
 
 
 
Iron pyrites for reducing ammonia volatilization losses from fertilizer 
urea applied to a sandy clay loam soil 
 
Ammonia volatilization (AV) is an impor-
tant mechanism for the loss of nitrogen 
applied to farm fields and may range from 
0 to 50% of applied N1,2. Sudhakara and 
Prasad3 reported a loss of 8.37% of surface 
applied urea-N due to AV from a rice field, 
while Sarkar et al.4 reported a loss of 15–
20% of applied urea-N due to AV from a 
wheat field. After application to a moist soil, 
urea hydrolyses to ammonium carbonate, 
which increases soil pH (8.5 or more). 
Ammonium carbonate then breaks down 
to CO2, NH3 and water
5 and part of the NH3 
formed is volatilized. AV losses can be re-
duced by the addition of acids6. 
 Large amounts of iron pyrites (about 
350 million tonnes) containing 22% S found
at Amjhore, Rohtas district, Bihar7, are being 
currently recommended for the reclamation 
of alkaline (sodic) soils8 and for meeting 
S deficiency in soil, which is widespread 
in the country9,10. Once applied to soil, 
iron pyrites are oxidized by the bacteria 
Thiobacillus ferroxidans ccording to the 
reaction given below11: 
 2FeS2 + 2H2O + 7O2 ®  
      2Fe2+ + 4SO2–4  + 4H
+. 
The acidity so produced may help in reduc-
ing AV losses. The present laboratory study 
was therefore conducted to find out if addi-
tion of pyrites to urea could help in reducing 
AV losses. 
 The laboratory incubation study was 
conducted on a sandy clay loam soil col-
lected from the surface 0–20 cm layer of 
an experimental field under the rice–wheat 
cropping system for the last 15 years at the 
Indian Agricultural Research Institute, New 
Delhi. The soil had a pH of 7.9 (1 : 2.5 soil : 
water) and contained 5.4 g organic C and 
0.5 g kjeldahl’s Nkg–1 soil. 
 The soil was air-d ied and ground to pass 
through a 2 mm sieve. One hundred grams 
soil was taken in each of the desired number 
of 250 ml beakers and was brought to field 
capacity (–10 kPa) moisture by adding the 
required quantity of distilled water; this 
moisture content was maintained by adding 
drops of water through the side of the beaker 
as and when required during the entire pe-
riod of study. Urea @ 56.6 mg N 100 g–1 
soil without or mixed with pyrite in 1 : 1, 
1 : 2 and 1 : 4 urea : pyrite ratios (w/w), as 
urface-applied. A 20 ml beaker containing 
10 ml boric acid mixed with methyl red 
indicator, was kept on the surface of the 
soil and the 250 ml beaker was made air-
tight by covering with an aluminium foil. 
Each day, the 10-ml boric acid beaker was 
replaced by a new one of similar type. 
Ammonia evolved and trapped in boric 
acid was titrated with 0.05 N H2SO4 and the 
amount of ammonia evolved was estimated. 
During incubation, the maximum and mini-
mum laboratory temperatures were 35± 2°C 
and 25 ± 2°C respectively. 
 AV loss from urea without pyrite was 
slow after the first day of incubation 
(1.28 mg N), peaked at 7.75 mg N after 2 
days of incubation and then tapered down 
to 1 mg N day–1 after 5 days of incubation 
(Table 1). AV loss was lower when urea 
was mixed with pyrite and it decreased 
as th  amount of pyrite in the mixture was 


Iron meteorite fall at Bhuka village, Barmer District, Rajasthan

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Iron meteorite fall at Bhuka village, Barmer District, Rajasthan

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