Empty holes in a field turn into meteor miningBY TRAVIS HEYINGThe Wichita EagleSteve Arnold tried to use humor to hide the disappointment. "You been missing one of these?" Arnold turned and asked landowner Ronald Ross after a backhoe exposed the rusty remnants of an old metal barrel beneath the dirt of Ross' 100-acre wheat field.
What Arnold was hoping to find was something that more resembled the 1,400-pound pallasite meteor he unearthed last October. The one expected to fetch anywhere from $1 million to $3 million.
Since Arnold's phenomenal celestial discovery, he's bought a home in Greensburg and now searches for meteors full time.
Using a metal detector that will penetrate 20 feet deep, Arnold, a Wichita native, pulls the device across wheat fields behind an old ATV.
With Arnold's notoriety due to his recent discovery, on Tuesday he drew a small audience when he decided to start digging.
Ross, a retired Kansas farmer now living in Sarasota, Fla., flew in when Arnold told him he was about to dig three holes in his field. Three places his metal detector told him he might find another buried treasure.
"When he called and said he had three prospects, my wife said I should go out and watch. And you always do what your wife says, don't you?" Ross said.
But so far all Arnold had to show him was a chunk of rusty metal.
Arnold drove away on his ATV and Ross saddled up on Dan Woods' backhoe.
A second dig began.
The second hole quickly grew deeper and deeper. Nothing was turning up.
"This is about the time I start to second-guess myself," Arnold said as the pile of dirt next to the hole reached five feet tall.
Arnold had told Ross that his third location, near a dirt road, was the least likely spot for a meteor. Most likely junk from someone's car.
If Arnold didn't unearth something fast, the only discovery Ross was going to make was that he flew from Florida to Kansas to watch someone dig a few big holes.
Arnold, with Woods' help, dragged his metal detector over the hole. Nothing.
"Why don't you try the dirt pile?" Woods asked.
The two men held the detector over the pile. It began buzzing.
Woods hopped up in the backhoe and pushed dirt off the pile.
"There!" Arnold yelled.
He jumped on the pile and within seconds was rolling out what looked like nothing more than a dirt-covered rock.
"Congratulations, Ron," Arnold said to the landowner. "You're the proud papa of a brand new baby pallasite meteor."
Arnold estimated that the meteor weighed 80 to 90 pounds. A disappointment, perhaps, when you compare it with his 1,400-pound find.
"What's it worth?" someone asked.
"Probably $60,000. Maybe more," Arnold said.
Ronald Ross just smiled.