History The first record of the Campo was in 1576. A Spanish governor learned of the iron from
the Indians who reportedly believed that it had fallen from heaven. The governor sent an
expedition under the command of one Captain de Miraval who brought back a few pieces of a
huge iron mass he called Meson de Fierro (large table of iron). The location of the find was the
Campo del Cielo (field of the sky or heaven), a fitting name for the location of a meteorite. Since
the Indians believed that the irons fell from heaven the name may have come from the
meteorites. The area is an open brush-covered plain that has little water and no other rocks
good country in which to locate meteorites.
Structure of the Campo del Cielo
The Campo del Cielo is described as a polycrystalline coarse octahedrite. At 3 mm the
Widmanstatten bands are thicker than those at Canyon Diablo or Odessa, but still thin enough to
have the same coarse octahedrite classification. The mass was composed of large austenite
crystals from 5 to 50 cm in size. On break-up the fragments were cold worked like those at
Sikhote-Alin and Gibeon. It has been hypothesized that the original body was tabular in shape
and broke up on entry into the atmosphere. Chemistry of the Campo del Cielo The Campo del
Cielo is classified in Group I, , 6.68% Ni, 0.43% Co, 0.25% P, 87 ppm Ga, 407 ppm Ge, 3.6 ppm
Ir. Of course, almost all of the remaining portion of the meteorite is iron. The important minerals
are: · Kamacite--this iron nickel alloy makes about 90 percent of specimens in finger size and
width crystals. Neumann bands are common. · Taenite and plessite, the other iron-nickel alloy
constituents are found at grain boundaries. · Schreibersite is uncommon. · Troilite is found
aggregates with graphite and silicates.