Exposure history of the Peekskill (H6) meteorite

— The Peekskill H6 meteorite fell on 1992 October 9. We report extensive measurements of cosmic-ray produced stable nuclides of He, Ne, and Ar, of the radionuclides 22Na, 60Co, 14C, 36Cl, 26Al, and 10Be, and of cosmic-ray track densities. After correction for shielding via the 22Ne/21Ne ratio, the concentrations of cosmic-ray produced 3He, 21Ne and 38Ar give an average exposure age of 25 Ma, which is considered to be a lower limit on the true value. The 10Be/21Ne age is 32 Ma and falls onto a peak in the H-chondrite exposure age distribution. The activities of 26Al, 14C, 36Cl, and 10Be are all close to the maximum values expected for H-chondrites. Together with cosmic-ray track densities and the 22Ne/21Ne ratio, these radionuclide data place the samples at a depth >20 cm in a meteoroid with a radius >40 cm. In contrast, the 60Co activity requires a near-surface location and/or a much smaller body. Calculations show that a flattened geometry for the Peekskill meteoroid does not explain the observations in the context of a one-stage irradiation. A two-stage model can account for the data. We estimate an upper bound of 70 cm on the radius of the earlier stage of irradiation and conclude that Peekskill's radius was <70 cm when it entered the Earth's atmosphere. This size limit is somewhat smaller than the dynamic determinations (Brown et al., 1994).