Here in Tucson right now we have the world's biggest mineral show going on. If you add in the part-timers who go somewhere whenever close to them, then you might approach a hundred.

How many other full-time meteorite hunters are there?ĭedicated, serious meteorite hunters? There are maybe 20 of us. Meteorites that fall in the ocean are just gone, disappeared to the bottom. Most of the Earth is inhospitable-heavy forest, jungle, ocean. Of course, there's millions and millions on the planet we just have to find them. There are a couple of hundred thousand known meteorites. How many meteorite fragments are known to be on Earth? The preliminary data from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory says about 7,000 tons landed. We want to know what's out there, and we want to know how big it is, and we want to know what damage it can cause.

Everyone wants to have a little piece of it. Why are so many people in Russia busy gathering up meteorite fragments? On Friday, as Russians reportedly scrambled to collect fragments from a passing meteorite that injured hundreds, Farmer spoke with National Geographic about his unusual line of work. Since the 1990s, the 40-year-old Tucson, Arizona, resident has been scouring the world for pieces of interstellar rock, racing to be the first one on the scene and selling his finds to museums and private collectors. Michael Farmer is one of the world's only full-time meteorite hunters.

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