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Surely a 5.5Ton meteorite could survive the heat off a building fire... Right? The director's statement that everything has been lost seems rather pessimistic.

Surely a 5.5Ton meteorite could survive the heat off a building fire... Right? The director's statement that everything has been lost seems rather pessimistic. There must be some sort of digital catalog of what was present in the museum that'll preserve it in some form.

danso 8y ago
The museum was reportedly in disrepair from lack of funds and appears to have a non-effective fire suppression system. I don’t think it’s a given that it had a robust digital archive. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/sep/03/fire-engulfs-brazil-national-museum-rio https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/sep/03/fire-engulfs-b...
- ericdykstra 8y ago
  Millions of priceless artifacts destroyed due to negligence by Brazil and all of the museums that loaned artifacts to a museum that didn't care to protect them.
  - samstave 8y ago
    How are we to know that the fire isnt a cover for a massive heist?
    - alister 8y ago
      Talking about museum heists in Rio, I went to see the Museu da Chácara do Céu -- an art museum hidden away on a mountain top -- because they had a Dalí, a Picasso, a Monet, and a Matisse according to a guidebook. I didn't see any of them. The front desk told me that they were all taken in a heist. They had a poster offering a surprisingly low R$5000 reward, about US$1250, for their recovery.
- MattBlissett 8y ago
  We have records of almost 270,000 preserved animal and plant specimens, for example leaves/flowers dried and pressed or whole insects most likely pinned down into a drawer. This is still useful data, for example knowing that a species used to be present in a particular area, but if a specimen is destroyed then in the absence of a photograph of the specimen (and sometimes that's not enough) the original assertion can no longer be verified. https://www.gbif.org/publisher/4205110f-3f0f-40d8-bd0f-2fa71bc827b5 https://www.gbif.org/publisher/4205110f-3f0f-40d8-bd0f-2fa71... (I work at GBIF, so I know this data exists, but otherwise I know nothing more than the article covers. I do not know what proportion of the total biodiversity collection 270,000 is, whether they were stored in this building, or whether there are images of them. As one example, they estimate 550,000 plant specimens, but share data of 42,000. That might well mean it isn't electronic, or it might mean it exists in a database but isn't yet shared as open data.)
userbinator 8y ago
Yes, I think the meteorite is the least of their worries. At worst it'll just be a little bit more sooty than it already was. It's all the other far less robust items which are the real concern. I'm somewhat optimistic about the fossils too --- which are pretty much rock already, so relatively heat-resistant.
- thomasfortes 8y ago
  I'm not... Even if they could survive the heat, most of the roof collapsed and at the moment the fire still is out of control...
matheusmoreira 8y ago
> There must be some sort of digital catalog I wouldn't count on it...
lucasfcosta 8y ago
The meteorite will probably survive, yes, but contamination will occur due to the flames and other burned chemicals. Also, you would expect museums to have digital catalogs of their collections, but that's not what happens in countries like Brazil. I'm a Brazilian living in Europe and only when I moved I could see all the "basic" things we don't have. Access to art and culture in Brazil is something awful.
ethelward 8y ago
> The director's statement that everything has been lost seems rather pessimistic. I'm not sure a some random commenter on HN can pretend to have a better perspective on the situation than the director of the museum himself.
- pbhjpbhj 8y ago
  A HN commenter could be more objective, however.
GW150914 8y ago
I don’t know about the catalogue, but assuming the meteorite is the usual rocky, iron-nickel composition then it wouldn’t have melted, given that a structure fire tends to top out several hundred degrees below the required temperature. Given that a meteorite has to survive the heat of reentry and impact, it seems unlikely to be fragile or have moisture that would cause fractures either. It would be contaminated and dirty, but not destroyed.

danso 8y ago

The museum was reportedly in disrepair from lack of funds and appears to have a non-effective fire suppression system. I don’t think it’s a given that it had a robust digital archive. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/sep/03/fire-engulfs-brazil-national-museum-rio https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/sep/03/fire-engulfs-b...

ericdykstra 8y ago
Millions of priceless artifacts destroyed due to negligence by Brazil and all of the museums that loaned artifacts to a museum that didn't care to protect them.
- samstave 8y ago
  How are we to know that the fire isnt a cover for a massive heist?
  - alister 8y ago
    Talking about museum heists in Rio, I went to see the Museu da Chácara do Céu -- an art museum hidden away on a mountain top -- because they had a Dalí, a Picasso, a Monet, and a Matisse according to a guidebook. I didn't see any of them. The front desk told me that they were all taken in a heist. They had a poster offering a surprisingly low R$5000 reward, about US$1250, for their recovery.
MattBlissett 8y ago
We have records of almost 270,000 preserved animal and plant specimens, for example leaves/flowers dried and pressed or whole insects most likely pinned down into a drawer. This is still useful data, for example knowing that a species used to be present in a particular area, but if a specimen is destroyed then in the absence of a photograph of the specimen (and sometimes that's not enough) the original assertion can no longer be verified. https://www.gbif.org/publisher/4205110f-3f0f-40d8-bd0f-2fa71bc827b5 https://www.gbif.org/publisher/4205110f-3f0f-40d8-bd0f-2fa71... (I work at GBIF, so I know this data exists, but otherwise I know nothing more than the article covers. I do not know what proportion of the total biodiversity collection 270,000 is, whether they were stored in this building, or whether there are images of them. As one example, they estimate 550,000 plant specimens, but share data of 42,000. That might well mean it isn't electronic, or it might mean it exists in a database but isn't yet shared as open data.)

userbinator 8y ago

Yes, I think the meteorite is the least of their worries. At worst it'll just be a little bit more sooty than it already was. It's all the other far less robust items which are the real concern. I'm somewhat optimistic about the fossils too --- which are pretty much rock already, so relatively heat-resistant.

thomasfortes 8y ago
I'm not... Even if they could survive the heat, most of the roof collapsed and at the moment the fire still is out of control...

matheusmoreira 8y ago

> There must be some sort of digital catalog I wouldn't count on it...

lucasfcosta 8y ago

The meteorite will probably survive, yes, but contamination will occur due to the flames and other burned chemicals. Also, you would expect museums to have digital catalogs of their collections, but that's not what happens in countries like Brazil. I'm a Brazilian living in Europe and only when I moved I could see all the "basic" things we don't have. Access to art and culture in Brazil is something awful.

ethelward 8y ago

> The director's statement that everything has been lost seems rather pessimistic. I'm not sure a some random commenter on HN can pretend to have a better perspective on the situation than the director of the museum himself.

pbhjpbhj 8y ago
A HN commenter could be more objective, however.

GW150914 8y ago

I don’t know about the catalogue, but assuming the meteorite is the usual rocky, iron-nickel composition then it wouldn’t have melted, given that a structure fire tends to top out several hundred degrees below the required temperature. Given that a meteorite has to survive the heat of reentry and impact, it seems unlikely to be fragile or have moisture that would cause fractures either. It would be contaminated and dirty, but not destroyed.