We recently visited the “Kebira” area, and found the “central uplift” to be an eroded outlier of the surrounding sandstone plateau, with undisturbed horizontal bedding throughout. The feature is the result of erosion, no evidence of impact origin.

The same is true for Paillou’s crater field, which have been visited both by myself and several other geologist groups. All the features described are clearly non-impact origin.

If one hit Earth today, likely it would land in the Ocean. Are we able to detect crater marks on the surface of the Ocean? Whats the biggest crater impact we know of in the solar-system?

To add further to this “crater search” discussion, for some time now I have thought that “maybe” the Manicouagan structure is a “double” impact site comparable to the Clear Water Lake double craters, both in northern Quebec, Canada.

Looking at the Manicouagan structure at N 51° 23′ W 68° 42′, notice that
there is a “second” circular structure immediately to the north. I have
illustrated this at: http://www.ottawa.rasc.ca/astronomy/earth_craters/possible_craters/index.html (look half way down the page) I highlighted the “circular” structure on the aeronautical chart. The geology in the area shown on the aeronautical chart reveals that:
a.. The contour lines denoting an increase in elevation of the Precambrianrocks to the north of the structure follows a semicircle;
b.. Two rivers on the east and west of the feature form an enclosingsemi-circle around the structure; and
c.. There is a central peak.

This could simply be the result of my “fertile” immagination, or could it?
Charles O’Dale
Meeting Chair
Ottawa RASC http://www.ottawa.rasc.ca/astronomy/earth_craters/index.html

200 Megatons is a pretty good fireworks show. I wonder what the fossil record in the area is like.
It would be interesting to see how long animal life took to return to the immideate area around the crater.
Contrasting local and global instictions (like that caused by Chicxulub impact) could be insightful.
It would give us a good idea of just how much damage could be done- and how long it would take to repair- next time a rock hits us.

I’m uncertain from the article on the geographic distribution of the shock-quartz. Localized to this region would make sense. Scattered across this and other regions would be less convincing. I’m not saying impacts haven’t happened in the region, I’m just doubting that this is the specific remains of a crater.

>So, you are right to be skeptical, but the shock quartz evidence is very strong. And further evidence, though not discussed by Phil, may have been collected to shore up the argument that a crater used to exist there.

Certainly any other evidence collected would be valuable. But the linked article doesn’t discuss other evidence. It discusses the shock-quartz from the standpoint of original data that caused El-Baz to start looking for the crater. He was asked if the crater could be identified and he replied no, but then decided to see if he could. This is his conclusion. That doesn’t mention other evidence.

This crater appears to be determined purely visually by El-Baz. It appears to me to be picking the items that fit the pre-conceived notion there is a round crater here. I don’t see anything other than the one curve on the top clump of erosion to suggest there’s a round spot here. The rest of the points on the dotted line appear to me to be picked because they are handy. I see no objective reason to pick them and not the similar features that surround them. That is my point. Any contextual evidence or ground evidence to support that choice would be great. Heck, a statement that the crater wall definition is a guess would be nice. It seems to me too defined without justification for that definition. That’s my reservation.

Maybe what I’m asking is to understand the details of El-Baz’s professional judgement. What is it he sees that defines this as a crater with the walls where he puts them?

True, the plan at the time was to convert the drop test simulator into a full Shuttle, but that didn’t happen.

I think NIgel is refering to the names on the shuttlecraft carried onboard the starship Enterprise. For example, on TOS there was one named “Galileo”. On Next Generation there were several named shuttlecraft, for example one was named “Feynman”.

Check out Red State Rabble..this is too funny.
Creationist Ken Hovind Director of the “Creationist Dino Park” in Florida
is in BIG trouble….seems that he never got the ok’s for Zoning…among some other real problems!

The very first shuttle, really just a test one…never flew in space is the
ENTERPRISE!:) Named for, you guessed it…Star Treks’ Enterprise.

“Despite the cloudy weather, the flash of light was visible as far as 1,000 kilometers distant, though the sound of the blast would not reach that far for forty-nine minutes, in the form of an indistinct, heavy blow. The giant fireball reached from ground-level to about 34,000 feet into the air, violently releasing 3800 times more explosive energy than the Hiroshima bomb– equivalent to fifty million metric tons of TNT. One hundred kilometers from ground zero the heat would have inflicted third degree burns. Atmospheric focusing produced areas of destruction hundreds of kilometers from ground zero, including wooden structures which were completely destroyed, and some shattered windows in Finland. The explosion’s atmospheric shockwave traveled around the Earth three times before it dissipated.”

“The mushroom cloud which followed the blast was enormous in scale. It stretched sixty kilometers into the sky, and had a diameter of about forty kilometers. Ionization from the explosion disrupted radio communications for the better part of an hour.”

There’s also a link to a Google Video clip of the bomb drop, in the comments. Now, 60 megatonnes is certainly bad enough, by the above description – can’t even begin to imagine a 200,000 megaton blast… let alone the much larger one that wiped out the overgrown lizards. Whew! :O

Its size is mid-way between the Kebira crater and the BP Structure.