The
Popigai crater in
SiberiaSiberia , is the vast region constituting almost all of Northern Asia and for the most part currently serving as the massive central and eastern portion of the Russian Federation, having served in the same capacity previously for the USSR from its beginning, and the Russian Empire beginning in the...
,
RussiaRussia , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia . It is a semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
is tied with
Manicouagan ReservoirManicouagan Reservoir is an annular lake in central Quebec, Canada. The lake covers an area of 1,942 km², and its eastern shore is accessible via Route 389. The island in the centre of the lake is known as René-Levasseur Island, and its highest point is Mount Babel...
as the
4th largest verified
impact craterIn the broadest sense, the term impact crater can be applied to any depression, natural or manmade, resulting from the high velocity impact of a projectile with a larger body...
on
EarthEarth is the third planet from the Sun. It is the fifth largest of the eight planets in the solar system, and the largest of the terrestrial planets in the Solar System in terms of diameter, mass and density...
. A large bolide impact created the 100-kilometer diameter crater 35.7 ± 0.2 (2σ)
millionOne million or one thousand thousand, is the natural number following 999,999 and preceding 1,000,001. The name is derived from Italian, where mille was 1,000, and 1,000,000 became milione, "a large thousand"....
yearA year is the amount of time it takes the Earth to make one revolution around the Sun...
s ago during the late
EoceneThe Eocene epoch, lasting from 55.8 ± 0.2 to 33.9 ± 0.1 Ma , is a major division of the geologic timescale and the second epoch of the Palaeogene period in the Cenozoic era. The Eocene spans the time from the end of the Paleocene epoch to the beginning of the Oligocene epoch. The start of the...
(Priabonian stage). The crater is just north of the Siberian city
NorilskNorilsk is a major city in Krasnoyarsk Krai, Russia, located between the Yenisey river and the Taymyr Peninsula. It was granted city status in 1953. It is the northernmost city in Siberia and the world's second largest city above the Arctic Circle. Norilsk with Yakutsk and Vorkuta are the only...
, or 1 1/2 hours (by helicopter) from the outpost of
KhatangaKhatanga is a village in the Taymyr Peninsula, in Krasnoyarsk Krai, Russia, located on the Khatanga River, south of the Arctic Ocean. It is one of the most northern inhabited localities in Russia . Its elevation is 98 ft above sea level. Population: 3,450...
.
The
Popigai crater in
SiberiaSiberia , is the vast region constituting almost all of Northern Asia and for the most part currently serving as the massive central and eastern portion of the Russian Federation, having served in the same capacity previously for the USSR from its beginning, and the Russian Empire beginning in the...
,
RussiaRussia , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia . It is a semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
is tied with
Manicouagan ReservoirManicouagan Reservoir is an annular lake in central Quebec, Canada. The lake covers an area of 1,942 km², and its eastern shore is accessible via Route 389. The island in the centre of the lake is known as René-Levasseur Island, and its highest point is Mount Babel...
as the
4th largest verified
impact craterIn the broadest sense, the term impact crater can be applied to any depression, natural or manmade, resulting from the high velocity impact of a projectile with a larger body...
on
EarthEarth is the third planet from the Sun. It is the fifth largest of the eight planets in the solar system, and the largest of the terrestrial planets in the Solar System in terms of diameter, mass and density...
. A large bolide impact created the 100-kilometer diameter crater 35.7 ± 0.2 (2σ)
millionOne million or one thousand thousand, is the natural number following 999,999 and preceding 1,000,001. The name is derived from Italian, where mille was 1,000, and 1,000,000 became milione, "a large thousand"....
yearA year is the amount of time it takes the Earth to make one revolution around the Sun...
s ago during the late
EoceneThe Eocene epoch, lasting from 55.8 ± 0.2 to 33.9 ± 0.1 Ma , is a major division of the geologic timescale and the second epoch of the Palaeogene period in the Cenozoic era. The Eocene spans the time from the end of the Paleocene epoch to the beginning of the Oligocene epoch. The start of the...
(Priabonian stage). The crater is just north of the Siberian city
NorilskNorilsk is a major city in Krasnoyarsk Krai, Russia, located between the Yenisey river and the Taymyr Peninsula. It was granted city status in 1953. It is the northernmost city in Siberia and the world's second largest city above the Arctic Circle. Norilsk with Yakutsk and Vorkuta are the only...
, or 1 1/2 hours (by helicopter) from the outpost of
KhatangaKhatanga is a village in the Taymyr Peninsula, in Krasnoyarsk Krai, Russia, located on the Khatanga River, south of the Arctic Ocean. It is one of the most northern inhabited localities in Russia . Its elevation is 98 ft above sea level. Population: 3,450...
. It is designated by
UNESCOThe United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization is a specialized agency of the United Nations established on 16 November 1945...
as a
GeoparkA Geopark is defined by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization in its UNESCO Geoparks International Network of Geoparks programme as follows:...
, a site of special geological heritage.
For decades the Popigai crater has fascinated paleontologists and geologists, but the entire area was completely off limits because of the diamonds and the mines constructed by
gulagThe Gulag or GULAG was the government agency that administered the penal labor camps of the Soviet Union. The term is infamous for its association with remote places where prisoners were kept and sometimes disappeared...
prisoners under
StalinJoseph Stalin was the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union's Central Committee from 1922 until his death in 1953...
; however, a major investigatory expedition was undertaken in 1997 (IPEX 1997) which greatly advanced understanding of the enigmatic structure. The impactor in this event has been identified as either an eight-kilometer diameter
chondriteChondrites are stony meteorites that have not been modified due to melting or differentiation of the parent body. They formed when various types of dust and small grains that were present in the early solar system accreted to form primitive asteroids...
asteroidthumb|260px|right|[[253 Mathilde]], a [[C-type asteroid]] measuring about across. Photograph taken in 1997 by the [[NEAR Shoemaker]] probe.Asteroids, sometimes called minor planets or planetoids, are small Solar System bodies in orbit around the Sun, especially in the inner Solar System; they are...
, or a five-kilometer diameter stony asteroid.
The shock pressures from the impact instantaneously transformed
graphiteThe mineral graphite is one of the allotropes of carbon. It was named by Abraham Gottlob Werner in 1789 from the Greek γραφειν : "to draw/write", for its use in pencils, where it is commonly called lead, as distinguished from the actual metallic element lead...
in the ground into
diamondIn mineralogy, diamond is an allotrope of carbon, where the carbon atoms are arranged in a variation of the face-centered cubic crystal structure called a diamond lattice. Diamond is the second most stable form of carbon, after graphite; however, the conversion rate from diamond to graphite is...
s within a 13.6 kilometer radius of the impact point. Diamonds are usually 0.5 to 2 millimeters in diameter; a few exceptional specimens are 10 millimeters in size. The diamonds not only inherit the tabular shape of the original graphite grains but they additionally preserve the original crystal's delicate striations.
Popigai is the best example yet of the formation of a crater of this type. Three other craters are larger, but they are either buried (
ChicxulubThe Chicxulub crater is an ancient impact crater buried underneath the Yucatán Peninsula in Mexico. Its center is located near the town of Chicxulub, after which the crater is named — as well as the rough translation of the Mayan name, "the tail of the devil." The crater is more than...
), strongly deformed (
SudburyThe Sudbury Basin, also known as Sudbury Structure or the Sudbury Nickel Irruptive, is a major geologic structure in Ontario, Canada. It is the second largest known impact crater or astrobleme on Earth, as well as one of the oldest....
), or deformed and severely eroded (
VredefortVredefort crater is the largest verified impact crater on Earth. It is located in the Free State Province of South Africa, and named after the town of Vredefort, which is situated near its centre. The site is also referred to as Vredefort dome or Vredefort impact structure...
).
There is a small possibility that Popigai impact crater formed simultaneous with the
c. 35
millionOne million or one thousand thousand, is the natural number following 999,999 and preceding 1,000,001. The name is derived from Italian, where mille was 1,000, and 1,000,000 became milione, "a large thousand"....
yearA year is the amount of time it takes the Earth to make one revolution around the Sun...
old
Chesapeake BayThe Chesapeake Bay impact crater was formed by a bolide that impacted the eastern shore of North America about 35.5 million years ago, in the late Eocene epoch. It is one of the best-preserved "wet-target" or marine impact craters, and the largest impact crater in the U.S...
and
Toms CanyonThe Toms Canyon impact crater is the site where one or more objects from space struck the Atlantic continental shelf, about 160 km east of Atlantic City, New Jersey....
impact craters.
External links