From Arizona to Mars: How Impact Craters Have Shaped the Solar System

Featured image: Meteor Crater, located in southwestern United States. Credit: David A. Kring (2017).

Book: Kring, D. (2017) Guidebook to the geology of Barringer Meteorite Crater, Arizona (a.k.a. meteor crater). 2nd edn. LPI Contribution No.2040.

Author: David A. Kring

Impact cratering has been occurring throughout geological time. Earth’s best preserved impact crater lies in Arizona. Barringer Meteorite Crater – or Meteor Crater – formed when an iron meteorite impacted into northern Arizona ~50,000 years ago. Since then, the landscape has seen little erosion, creating a beautifully preserved impact crater. The site can be accessed by tourists only in restricted areas, but the wider crater can be used by select geologists and is used by NASA to train astronauts… and somehow, I found myself there alongside a group of PhD students from across the world.

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