Muawia Shaddad
The University of Khartoum astronomer who led students across the Nubian Desert to recover Almahata Sitta in 2008.
Key facts
- Nationality
- Sudanese
- Field
- Astronomer
Muawia H. Shaddad is an astronomer and physicist at the University of Khartoum in Sudan. When the small asteroid 2008 TC3 exploded high over the north of his country in October 2008, he worked with Peter Jenniskens to look for any pieces that had survived.
The fragments were expected to be small and spread along a track many kilometres long in remote desert, near a railway station known simply as Station Six, or Almahata Sitta in Arabic. Shaddad organised the expedition, recruiting students and staff from his university and arranging transport and supplies. In December 2008 the team walked side by side in long lines across the sand and gravel, scanning the ground for dark stones.
Their patience paid off. The first fragment was found on the second day, and the searches eventually recovered about 600 pieces, with a total mass of about 10.5 kilograms. The meteorites were named Almahata Sitta after the station, and they turned out to be mostly ureilites, a rare type of achondrite.
The search showed what careful teamwork can achieve, and it gave many Sudanese students a part in a world first. The meteorites are curated at the University of Khartoum and studied by scientists around the world.
On the timeline
- December 2008Almahata Sitta is recovered