Students mark heavenly find

EXCITED Clyde Primary School students were on hand at Scienceworks yesterday as Cranbourne-13, a 4.5 billion-year-old space rock, headlined a special exhibition. Cranbourne-13 is the 13th space rock to be discovered from a meteorite shower in Cranbourne in the 1800s.
The owner of the rock, who found it on his Clyde property earlier in the year, had no idea of the significance of his discovery until he brought it to the school.
“The person who found the rock had been driving a tractor around it for years and nicked it accidentally one day and decided to move it,” school principal Martin Shepherd said.
“When he realised how heavy it was, and after it was brought to the school, the idea came that this could possibly be a meteorite.”
The owner of the 85kg rock donated it to Museum Victoria and scientists at the museum tested samples and concluded it was a meteorite.
Mr Shepherd said the students were delighted to attend the Scienceworks exhibition, Earth Quest – Outer Space to Inner Earth.
“There was a lot of excitement at the school at the time and the kids have learnt much about how uncommon they (meteorites) are.”
Earth Quest will feature 30 interactive exhibits, with the highlight being Cranbourne-13.
Geologist and manager of natural science collections at Museum Victoria Dermot Henry said the meteorite was an exciting find.
“We get a lot of rocks brought into Museum Victoria that people think are meteorites. But there have only been four in the last 25 years that have turned out to be so.”
Earth Quest runs at Scienceworks from 6 December to 19 April next year.