Twannberg History
DISCOVERIES 2010 - 2016
Investigations on the first three masses led to the fact, that there must be many more pieces of the Twannberg meteorite. Under the lead of Prof. Dr. Beda Hofmann, curator of the Natural History Museum in Bern, a search team investigated the Twannberg region over a period of almost four years.
Searches in this region are only permitted with an official concession!
Several members of the team were searching sometimes for weeks at a time under good and sometimes rather nasty weather conditions with strong winds, heavy rain and even snow! Many of these searches were successful and up to now, more than 500 additional pieces have been unearthed. Strangely, some of the meteorites were found just 10 to 15 cm deep in the ground, others up to 40 cm deep. Every found meteorite has to be documented and then tested and analyzed at the nat. hist. museum in Bern, where every meteorite is also listed and numbered. A part of every found meteorite belongs to the museum (10% or more, depending on the weight).
SEARCH FOR THE TWANNBERG-METEORITE
Two years ago I had the chance to search for the Twannberg meteorite the first time. But only in March this year I joined the search team officially. I dug hundreds of holes and found a lot of iron waste, but not until Friday, April 29, 2016, I found my first Twannberg meteorite, as a matter of fact, my very first meteorite find ever: a nice 15.4 gram piece (picture below)) I found a couple of more promising pieces, but unfortunately they turned out to be just iron waste.
ARCHAEOLOGICAL FINDS AND IRON WASTE
It‘s hard to believe, how much iron waste is hidden in a agricultural field: the search team unearthed more than 500 kilos of iron waste: nails, barb wire, tools, cow bells, ox shoes, ...
An expert also noticed a few rare Roman and even Celtic artifacts!
SPECIAL EXHIBITION 2016
THE TWANNBERG IIG IRON METEORITE
"Raiders of the lost treasure"
Below a few pictures of the opening of the exhibition on Thursday, 18 August, 2016, at the Natural History Museum in Bern. It was a really exciting and successful event. Many of the members of the search team and special guests met for the official opening.
More information about the exhibition you find here:
TWANNBERG FRIENDS
After a hard day searching for the Twannberg meteorite, the team members from Switzerland, Germany, Morocco, Czech Republic, Russia, USA, Sweden, Poland and Uruguay had a lot of fun, as usual in the meteorite community, a friendly, cosmopolitan event!
TWANNBERG REGION
The Twannberg mountain and Mount Sujet are located in the Bernese Jura region. Completely surrounded by nature, it offers a breathtaking view of Le Pays des Trois-Lacs (the three-lake region), against the backdrop of the Alps.
Just 20 minutes from the centre of Biel, this region offers you a whole range of activities: culture, nature, gastronomy and much more.
Visit the official tourism website for more information:
