Fragments of a rare meteorite that lit up the night sky over northern Europe last week have been recovered in rural England, with UK scientists calling it their most significant find in the past three decades.

One lump, which weighed nearly 300 grams, was found in someone's driveway in the English county Gloucestershire. Richard Greenwood, a research fellow of planetary sciences at the Open University, was on hand to go and get it.

"It was like seeing an old friend," said the scientist: "It was a very rare meteorite that I'd studied 30 years ago in the Natural History Museum."

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Scientists also managed to locate other fragments of the meteorite after reconstructing its flight path and sending out a message through local media for people in the area to look out for any signs of the rock. 

Thrilled by what he described as a "very emotional" discovery, Greenwood added: "Not only have we got the first meteorite in 30 years in the UK – we've got an extremely rare type."

Out of around 65,000 meteorites found on Earth, just 51 are carbonaceous chondrites and this is the first one to be found in England to date.

The discovery is so significant, according to Greenwood, because most meteorites usually come from the inner part of the asteroid belt close to the Earth, whereas this specimen is believed to come from near Jupiter, which is much further away.

"It's cold out there and it reserves basically all the materials from the early solar system," he said. Adding the meteorites can be used to date the solar system: "That's where we get the age of 4.6 billion years for the age of the solar system and these rocks."  

According to the scientist, inside the meteorite there are tiny forms of material from stars that are even older than our solar system. 

Now, scientists can use the discovery, Greenwood said, "to study stars that lived and died and contributed to our solar system in its very earliest days."

Most of the UK's meteorites are held at London's Natural History Museum in London, which is where this one is headed. Then scientists from all over the world will be able to bid for a small piece of it for their research. 

"It's actually a lot of material," said Greenwood: "So it's going to keep people going for a very long time."