The oldest and ‘biggest ever’ asteroid crater discovered in Greenland

August 19, 2013 rockman Miscellaneous Comments Off on The oldest and ‘biggest ever’ asteroid crater discovered in Greenland
Artist rendering of a giant meteorite impact in Greenland some 3 billion years ago

Artist rendering of a giant meteorite impact in Greenland some 3 billion years ago

A team of geologists from the Geological Survey of Denmark and Greenland (GEUS) in Copenhagen, Cardiff University in Wales, Lund University in Sweden and the Institute of Planetary Science in Moscow has found the remains of a giant asteroid impact crater in Western Greenland that is over 3 billion years old! Preliminary size estimates of the impacting meteorite at Maniitsoq suggest it may have had a diameter of approximately 30 km resulting in an impact crater of somewhere around 500-600 km.

If an impact of this size hit the Earth today, it would not only be able to pulverise a medium-sized national state but its global effects would also kill all higher life.

Thanks to my colleague Bob Cummings of Saguaro GeoServices for sending this one my way!

[Source: Read more about this interesting find at the Mail Online. Image: Mail Online]