Other Geological

Hazards-Bolide Impact,
Ground Subsidence, and
Coastal Erosion
 Bolide Impact
- Any extraterrestrial object.
- Bolide impact events apparently happen less
frequently and seem to be the least likely to occur.
- These may pose one of the largest, if not the
greatest, threats to the existence of the human race.
 Bolide Impact
- Do you know that a comet/
asteroid impact around 66
million years ago is being looked
at as the most probable cause of
the extinction of the dinosaurs
and about 75 percent of animal
and plant species?
 Bolide Impact
- This is due primarily to the impact winter that
it caused, wherein plants and plankton were
unable to undergo photosynthesis because
sunlight was being blocked by the particulate
matter ejected into the atmosphere.
- The asteroid impact left evidence of its
occurrence, though now largely obliterated.
-Effects of such large impacts may also include
large worldwide earthquakes and volcanic
eruptions, tsunamis, wildfires, and drastic
changes in climatic conditions. Meteor Crater in Arizona
 or k-Pg extinction
event
- The event that caused mass extinction 65 million years ago
is now known as the Cretaceous- Paleogene or k-Pg
extinction event (formerly known as the Cretaceous-Tertiary
or K-T extinction).
- Evidence of this impact is an approximately 180 km wide
and 20 km deep obscured crater which is located partly on
the tip of the Yucatan Peninsula and partly underwater I the
Gulf of Mexico. It is called the Chicxulub crater since it is
centered in this ton in Mexico.
Chelyabinsk, Southern
Russia
- Very recently, on February 15, 2013, a 12,00- 13, 000
metric ton and 17 to 20 meter wide meteor as fast as 19
kilometers per second burst in the air at an altitude of about
29 km over Chelyabinsk, southern Russia.
- The estimated energy released by the explosion was
equivalent to that produced by the explosion of around 20
to 30 Hiroshima bombs.
 1908 Tunguska,
Siberia Bolide Impact
- Prior to Chelyabinsk meteorite impact,
The largest known bolide impact in the
modern times was the 1908 Tunguska
event which wreaked havoc in a remote
forest in Siberia.
 What on Earth Are
Impact Events?
- When an asteroid, a comet, or a meteoroid hits the Earth’s surface,
the portion of the ground which is hit becomes severely compressed
and deformed.
- Instantaneously, rock fragments from the impact site (called ejecta)
hurl into the atmosphere and eventually fall back to the ground
around a bowl-shaped depression surrounded by a raised rim.
- The depression excavated by the impactor is called an impact crater.
 What on Earth Are
Impact Events?
A time-lapse
of what
usually takes
place during
an impact
event.
 Asteroids, Comets, and
Meteorites
1. Asteroids- are large stony
and/or metallic chunks which are
confined in the region between
Mars and Jupiter, called the
Asteroid belt, and which orbit the
sun just like any planet.
- Asteroids can be as big as 3
kilometers in average diameter,
but are mostly 100 meters to 1
kilometer wide.
 Asteroids, Comets, and
Meteorites
2. Comets- are combinations of ice,
rock fragments, and dust which come
from either the Oort cloud, which is 50,
000 Astronomical Units or AU (1AU=
240,000,000 km) away from the Sun or
from the Kuiper belt of comets within
the solar system that is 30-55 AU away.
- They have a characteristic glowing tail
formed by the solar wind and the sun
radiation pressure on the stream of gas
and dust of the comet.
 Asteroids, Comets, and
Meteorites
3. Meteorites- are the same
as meteoroids except that
meteorites have already hit
the Earth’s surface.
- Meteors, on the other
hand, are those which are
still in flight in the Earth’s
atmosphere and give off a
characteristic light streak.
Evidence of Past Impacts
- Aside from the impact crater itself and the meteorite/s ,
both of which could sometimes already be missing,
evidence of impact could be in the form of materials like
tektites, impact breccia, shatter cones, impact spherules,
shocked quartz, coesite; chemical traces such as high levels
of Iridium; and geophysical signatures like circular
magnetic and gravity (density) anomalies and seismic
reflection images (Which provide images of the appearance
of the subsurface both on land and offshore).
Evidence of Past Impacts
Tektites- a small black glassy object, many of which are
found over certain areas of the earth's surface.
Evidence of Past Impacts
Impact breccia- is a rock composed of broken fragments of
minerals or rock cemented together by a fine-grained
matrix.
Evidence of Past Impacts
Shatter cones are rare geological features that are only
known to form in the bedrock beneath meteorite impact
craters or underground nuclear explosions.
Evidence of Past Impacts
Impact Spherules are the most obvious indication of
asteroid impacts, but craters on Earth are quickly obscured
or destroyed by surface weathering and tectonic processes.
Evidence of Past Impacts
Shocked Quartz these quartz grains show lines that are
characteristic of high shock and are found only with
meteorite impacts or atomic explosions.
Evidence of Past Impacts
Coesite is a very rare mineral that forms in unique ultra high
metamorphism usually as a result of meteorite impacts.