The Magnet Test
Here is a test you can run the moment your FRGMNT° piece arrives: hold a strong magnet to it. It sticks, and it sticks hard. That is not a gimmick, it is basic chemistry, and it is one of the fastest non-destructive ways to confirm you are holding real iron meteorite material.
Why iron meteorites are magnetic
Iron meteorites are roughly 92% iron and 6% nickel, with trace cobalt, phosphorus, and other elements. Iron is ferromagnetic, so it responds strongly to magnetic fields. At that concentration the pull is immediate and significant. A neodymium magnet clings to a genuine piece without hesitation. This is not a faint attraction you have to search for. A piece of iron meteorite and a decent magnet find each other.
What it rules out
Most common rocks, granite, limestone, sandstone, and basalt, are not magnetic or only weakly so. Terrestrial rock that does respond, such as magnetite-bearing basalt, usually pulls far more weakly and looks completely different up close. The magnet test alone will not confirm a meteorite, since some man-made alloys also respond, but it is a fast first filter. If a supposed iron meteorite does not stick to a strong magnet, treat that as a red flag.
The composition is the story
That 92% iron figure is not just trivia for the magnet test, it is a record of origin. The ratio reflects the iron-nickel core of an asteroid, where gravity and heat separated heavy metals from lighter silicate rock over millions of years. No surface process on Earth produces metallic iron at that purity. Terrestrial iron ore is iron oxide, iron bonded to oxygen, and it has to be smelted to become metal. The iron in your piece arrived already metallic, processed by forces older than this planet. The magnet just lets you feel that difference.
*****WARNING*****
A strong magnet proves the metal is real. Use a gentle hand anyway.
Locked inside this fragment is a faint magnetic record, set as it cooled in deep space billions of years ago. It is a signal older than Earth, the kind researchers read to understand how worlds are made. A powerful magnet pressed against raw stone can overwrite it, erasing what no instrument can restore.
Yours has already been verified, so a brief test changes nothing. But know what you are holding. Some history survives only as long as it is left undisturbed.