K4ZRD Brahin Meteorite, All Rights Reserved, Created December 20, 2004, Remastered May 4, 2007

The first Brahin Meteorite specimen was discovered in 1810 in the Minsk, Belorussia region of Russia by the farmers of Kaporenki, a village in the estate of Bragin. The estate belonged to Graf Rakitsky, the State Advisor, Inspector of The Schools of Rechitsky, Uezd. Rakitsky gave the specimen to scientists in the area. During World War II, samples of Brahin were reportedly stolen from Kiev by German soldiers. Other samples of Brahin in Minsk also disappeared without any trace during the war. The exact location of this particular specimen has been recorded in history at 52' 30' north, 30' 20' east. Two masses of about 80 kilograms (kg) and 20kg respectively were initially found in 1810, and a third of 183kg later. To date only eleven masses are listed as being found with a total weight 1000kgs, including masses of 73kg found in 1952, 12.7kg found in 1968 and 21.8kg found in 1979.

The strewn field is 3km wide by 15km long and is across the river from the Ukraine. Much of the strewn field is still too radio active from the Chernobyl blast which occured many years ago, to be safely searched still at this time. Much of the area has been permanently sealed off from collecting. The area in which this specimen was found reportedly has above 3 times normal background radiation. The Southern area of the strewn field has 75 times background radiation. The radiation affects the first few inches of soil and is undetectable at greater depths.

The Brahin Meteorite is a Stony-Iron Pallasite, main group, with fragmental olivine shapes embedded in an iron-nickel matrix as illustrated in the above photograph. The crystals are a beautiful golden/green in color. They are scattered throughout the nickel-iron matrix alloy. Pallasites are rarely ever found, and are only held by museums, and a very limited number of private collections around the world. They compose only 1.8 percent of all known meteorites discovered on earth.The Brahin ( also known as Bragin ) is an extremely rare meteorite with only a few reported speciments known to be held in private collections worldwide.

The Laboratory of Meteoritics in Moscow, Russia, which was formed in 1998, is the documenting authority on the Brahin Meteorite. The Laboratory has two divisions, the Central Division at the Vernadsky Institute in Moscow, and the Cosmo-Chemistry Division in Chernogolovka. Both laboratories conduct research in the scientific traditions for the Worldwide Meteorite Committee ( WMC ). They perform leading-edge research on the formation and evolution of solar nebula material, accretion, differentiation, metamorphism, exogamic dating, and history of cosmic bodies. Their major objects of investigation are: Meteorites, Lunar Soil, diffusely distributed extraterrestrial material in sedimentary rocks, impact craters and impactites. The laboratory holds the sole Russian lunar sample collection, and houses the meteorite collection of the Russian Academy of Sciences, the Vernadsky Institute Museum of Extraterrestrial Material, and the Meteorite Exhibit at the Fersman Mineralogical Museum. The Laboratory's staff includes 12 scientists, including 1 Doctor of Science and 3 Doctors of Philosophy. It has been proposed by these Scientists that the Brahin Meteorite represents the interface between the heavy metal core and the lighter stone mantle of an asteroid or planetoid which was formed during the very early creation of our own solar system. An analysis of this meteorite found that it is 8.38 percent Nickel-Iron, and 37.18 percent olivine by weight. The time and circumstances of the Brahin appearance on Earth has never been documented by any record in history, or by any scientific geological testing in the region.

On July 19, 2004 Doctor M. A. Nazarov, Research Scientist, Laboratory of Meteoritics in Moscow, Russia, contacted the owner of this particular 0.141 kilogram specimen in the Lowry Collection, and advised that he and his research facility had conducted extensive studies on the Brahin Meteorite particulary examining “phase chemistry”, “mineral modes”, and “trace element chemistry” of this particular Brahin Pallasite. He stated that based upon his studies this particular Brahin Pallasite specimen is over 4.5 million years old. He estimated that the Brahin main mass had travelled millions of billions of miles prior to it's contact with our planet. He was unable to state the time period of our planet's evolution during which the Brahin fell to earth, however he estimated the event was over two hundred million years in the past.

Very little information is available on the Brahin Meteorite, however a limited amount of such information is available through universities, and research centers worldwide as well as through the Internet.