By SCOTT SONNER, Associated Press RENO, Nev. (AP) — Robert Ward
has been hunting and collecting meteorites for more than 20
years, so he knew he'd found something special in the Sierra
foothills along the path of a flaming fireball that shook parts
of Northern California and Nevada with a sonic boom over the
weekend. And scientists have confirmed his suspicions: it's one
of the more primitive types of space rocks out there, dating to
the early formation of the solar system 4 to 5 billion years
ago. "It was just, needless to say, a thrilling moment," Ward of
Prescott, Ariz., told The Associated Press in a telephone
interview Wednesday as he walked through an old cemetery in
search of more meteorites about 35 miles northeast of
Sacramento. He found the first piece on Tuesday along a road
between a baseball field and park on the edge of Lotus near
Coloma, where James W. Marshall first discovered gold in
California, at Sutter's Mill in 1848. Ward, who has found
meteorites in every continent but Antarctica and goe