METEORITE FINDS BY EUROMET NEAR FRONTIER MOUNTAIN, NORTH VICTORIA-LAND, ANTARCTICA

A team from EUROMET (a joint initiative of scientific institutions in Europe interested in meteorites) was sent for the first time to Antarc tica in the 1990/91 season to undertake a systematic search for meteor ites. The project was organised within the framework of the Italian An tarctic Program (Programma Nationale di Richerche in Antartide, PNRA). The search was carried out in the vicinity of Frontier Mountain (Nort h Victoria Land) and 256 meteorite fragments were discovered, most of which were wind-blown across the blue-ice field to the NE of Frontier Mountain and finally caught in an ice depression about 5 km to the N. The larger meteorites which remained on the ice surface from which the y were uncovered may have been transported down to the mountain edge w here they have subsequently been destroyed or covered in debris. A sea rch for meteorites at neighbouring Sequence Hills, where similar glaci ological conditions as at Frontier Mountain exist, proved unsuccessful . At this location the surface of the blue ice in the valleys with sus pected meteorite concentrations was covered by meltwater lakes.