Jovan Culjkovic has been a collector for over 20 years. He collects many things, including fossils, rocks and even banknotes. But one thing sets him apart from other collectors: He also collects meteorites.
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00:00Jovan Čuljaković is a man on a mission.
00:03He's searching for something that's very precious to him.
00:06But he's not looking for money or ancient treasure.
00:09He's hoping to find something that fell to Earth from outer space.
00:12Čuljaković is a meteorite collector.
00:15I always look for it, wherever I go in nature.
00:18My eyes are always focused on the ground, on rocks,
00:23and I know how to recognize them.
00:26When I found the first meteorite,
00:29I started studying meteorites.
00:32So I learned a lot about them,
00:35and now I'm used to recognizing them in the mass of rocks.
00:51My favorite meteorite is the one I found first.
00:54It's so beautiful.
00:57It's the most preserved one.
01:00In those times, under meteorological conditions,
01:03it loses its outer glow.
01:06It's pale.
01:09You can see the minerals of oil on the surface.
01:12That's one of the signs that it's a meteorite.
01:25They are easiest to spot on polar ice caps and in the desert.
01:29Professor Dragan Gajic, a retired professor
01:32and president of the Alpha Astronomical Society,
01:35says they can easily be identified by amateurs.
01:38In principle, if it's made of iron,
01:41you can use a magnet to determine
01:44whether it's made of iron.
01:47It's 96% iron and nickel.
01:51When you pull a magnet through sand,
01:54what's left on the magnet,
01:57even if it's made of some earthly material,
02:00those tiny particles,
02:03those are the metal micrometeorites.
02:06There are several types of rocks.
02:09Usually, when they pass through the atmosphere,
02:12their surface layer is scattered.
02:16It turns into a glass sheet,
02:19like a sheet of cloth.
02:23Meteorites have been crashing to Earth
02:26for millions of years.
02:29According to NASA,
02:32about 48.5 tonnes,
02:35or 44,000 kilos of meteoritic material,
02:38falls on Earth every day.
02:53It moves at a high speed,
02:56at least 11.2 km per second.
02:59That's the speed you'd have to throw something
03:02to make it fly off the Earth.
03:05At least 11.2 km per second.
03:08The body warms up in the Earth's atmosphere
03:11at an altitude of about 100 km.
03:14If the body completely burns,
03:17and the remaining micrometeorites fall like dust,
03:20the light we see is a meteor.
03:23If the body survives
03:26that passage through the atmosphere,
03:29and falls on the Earth's surface,
03:32a good part of it will melt,
03:35evaporate, and so on.
03:38If the body falls on the Earth's surface,
03:41it's a meteorite.
03:44But Jovan Čuljaković collects more than just meteorites.
03:47He's fascinated by fossils,
03:50semi-precious stones, and old banknotes.
03:53He has a suitcase containing about 20,000 old banknotes
03:56of various currencies,
03:59some of which come from countries that no longer exist.
04:02It's a great passion.
04:05All collectors who collect various collections,
04:08if they don't have bread to eat,
04:11they will buy something that is dear to them.
04:15It's a great passion.
04:18Meteorites can be very valuable,
04:21in both a scientific and a material sense.
04:24Čuljaković could get his meteorites valued,
04:27but he's not interested in doing so.
04:30For him, it's all about the joy of collecting things he loves.