RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – Coming from Argentina, an unflagged ship crossed into the waters of Uruguay, where, alerted by a patrol, its crew members fled leaving on board a box containing a meteorite whose value was estimated at one million dollars.
This is how the Uruguayan Navy detailed this Monday, by means of a press release, the unusual event that occurred last March 16, which resulted in a judicial investigation that is still in progress.
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That day, after receiving a communication from the Prefectura Naval Argentina, the personnel of the Prefectura del Puerto of the homonymous capital of the Uruguayan department (province) of Paysandú (northwest), began the search for the unidentified ship.
According to the statement, the two people on the small boat managed to flee into the bush in the area, known as “Piedra del Gaucho”, and the officers lost track of their whereabouts but were able to examine the boat.
There, according to the Uruguayan Navy, they found “a completely closed box” containing “a rock of great size and weight”.
As the case was referred to the local prosecutor’s office, the seizure of the object was ordered, which was handed over to the Faculty of Sciences of the University of the Republic (Udelar) for an expert examination.
Analyzed by the geologist Claudio Gaucher, the rock turned out to be a “metallic-type meteorite” and it was indicated that it came from “Campo del Cielo (Argentina), the largest known metallic meteorite.” Later, the Navy statement stated that “the price of this type of pieces is approximately US$1,000 per kilo. But the price per kilo increases depending on the weight and rarity of the rock; in this case it is one of the largest found, exceeding a million dollars if the entire piece were sold”, which led to the erroneous interpretation that the piece seized in Paysandú could be worth that million dollars, when in fact that amount would correspond to all the fragments of the meteorite found so far, which are several hundred.