Utah & Arizona Part 5 - Meteor Crater, AZ
Before going back to Salt Lake City, Utah, there was one more attraction in Arizona that we went to see. It was the Meteor Crater 35 miles east of Flagstaff off I-40. It snowed all night at Flagstaff and in the morning. So we expected to see a Meteor Crater filled with snow. But just a few miles down on the freeway and there was no sign of snow in sight(little did we know then that it would take a lot more than just a few hours of snow to fill the Meteor Crater). It was still chilly outside but very clear and bright. Except for the driving part, we really didn't mind the snow since we don't get much of it in Washington. So its always a pleasure to experience it.
As expected, the Meteor Crater Discovery Center was at a location in the middle of no where in the Arizonian desert. I think the Grand Canyon in Arizona kind of hogs all the limelight, which is probably why there were not many tourists at this place, or I wonder if it was off-season this time of the year. Nevertheless we were excited about seeing this unique Natural Landmark. After paying the entry fee we went directly to the theatre. Shows were scheduled every hour or so and the movie titled " Collisions & Impacts" was 10 minutes long. It showed us a brief representation of how the collision could have happened and what might have led to the formation of the Crater as we see it today. After the movie, a guide gave us some more details about the Crater and also answered some of our questions.
Now let me explain the history of the Meteor Crater and its extraordinary nature with some facts based on what I gathered from the visitor center, movie and reading material. As the name suggests this Crater was formed after a Meteor hit the plain unbroken, rocky surface of our Earth, around 50,000 years ago, at a location that is now known as Flagstaff in Arizona. 50,000 years seems like a long time ago but wait till you read the rest of the story. Scientists believe that this rock was broken off from an asteroid in a collision about half a billion years ago and was put in a path toward Earth due to that collision. Half a billion years - a really long time? Yes it is, but there is more... And so the meteor hit the Earth with a velocity of 26,000 miles per hour hitting the surface with a force of 20 million tons of TNT(Trinitrotoluene). The meteorite was supposedly made of iron & nickel. Its estimated size was 150 ft wide and weighed approximately 300,000 tons. When it hit the earth at such tremendous velocity, it created about 20 million pounds per sq inch of pressure. This led to some vaporization(of iron & nickel!!!), extensive melting & fragmentation of the meteorite. The meteorite displaced about 175 million tons of limestone & sandstone and formed this Crater that was 700 ft. deep & 4000 ft. wide at the time. I am amazed to imagine the amount heat, pressure & force that might have been created to vaporize a metal like iron or nickel! The meteorite is now 550 ft. deep, equivalent to a 60 storey building and 2.4 miles in circumference. The pictures make it look deceptively shallow and smaller in circumference than it actually is. It gave me a better picture when I read that its equivalent to 20 football fields kept together with 2 million spectators seated on its sloping sides. In the pictures with the ariel view, the Discovery Center built on the Craters edge goes almost unnoticed. The meteor as such was not so huge, but the impact of the collision is what let to the Meteor Crater being of these dimensions.
After the movie we walked around the museum seeing the pictures and reading amazing facts and history of the formation of the Crater. The most incredible thing in the museum (apart from the Crater itself of course) is The Fragment(as I call it). A fragment, a rather heavy(650Kgs) and large one was on display at the museum. Now here it comes - this fragment was a part of the meteor that hit the Earth 50,000 yrs ago, which broke off from an asteroid in a collision that took place half a billion years ago with another heavenly body, which in turn could have been part of a planet in our solar system that under went fragmentation millions or even billions of light years ago!! This trip was turning out to be more interesting than I thought it would be. I seemed to be loosing a lot of things that I never really gave much thought to. If I lost sense of scale and proportion at the Grand Canyon, I had totally lost sense of time here at the Meteor Crater, and still have not got it back. How is one supposed to imagine billions and billions of light years to get an idea if time? Here we are talking about a piece of rock that has actually travelled through several periods of time, through different worlds and here it is lying in a museum in Arizona as a result of a series of events that started occurring many billions of light years ago in some part of our solar system. To me that seems incredibly mind-boggling.
Apart from the fact that this fragment is from an alien planet and origin, this piece of metal rock could easily be one of the oldest things found on our planet today - billions of light years old, probably existing even before earth was formed. We touched and felt the cool metal that literally once belonged to another world and time. This was the closest I ever got to having a close encounter of a third kind! It was amazing once we think about it.
I wonder if we have a part in the Grand Scheme of things in this Universe even as small as a speck of dust. It makes me wonder how our actions small or big affects the Universe and whether they do put in motion a series of events that some how produce an effect later on some time, some where in this Universe. Judging from this experience, it makes me believe that they do.
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P.S. Some interesting definitions that the guide told us :
Meteoroid - rock fragments flying in space.
Meteor - any bright object, natural or man-made, flying through Earth's atmosphere.
Meteorite - Meteor after hitting the Earth's surface.(He agreed that as per this definition, the Crater is wrongly named. It should ideally be Meteorite Crater instead of Meteor Crater. But I guess they are keeping this name itself)
Now let me explain the history of the Meteor Crater and its extraordinary nature with some facts based on what I gathered from the visitor center, movie and reading material. As the name suggests this Crater was formed after a Meteor hit the plain unbroken, rocky surface of our Earth, around 50,000 years ago, at a location that is now known as Flagstaff in Arizona. 50,000 years seems like a long time ago but wait till you read the rest of the story. Scientists believe that this rock was broken off from an asteroid in a collision about half a billion years ago and was put in a path toward Earth due to that collision. Half a billion years - a really long time? Yes it is, but there is more... And so the meteor hit the Earth with a velocity of 26,000 miles per hour hitting the surface with a force of 20 million tons of TNT(Trinitrotoluene). The meteorite was supposedly made of iron & nickel. Its estimated size was 150 ft wide and weighed approximately 300,000 tons. When it hit the earth at such tremendous velocity, it created about 20 million pounds per sq inch of pressure. This led to some vaporization(of iron & nickel!!!), extensive melting & fragmentation of the meteorite. The meteorite displaced about 175 million tons of limestone & sandstone and formed this Crater that was 700 ft. deep & 4000 ft. wide at the time. I am amazed to imagine the amount heat, pressure & force that might have been created to vaporize a metal like iron or nickel! The meteorite is now 550 ft. deep, equivalent to a 60 storey building and 2.4 miles in circumference. The pictures make it look deceptively shallow and smaller in circumference than it actually is. It gave me a better picture when I read that its equivalent to 20 football fields kept together with 2 million spectators seated on its sloping sides. In the pictures with the ariel view, the Discovery Center built on the Craters edge goes almost unnoticed. The meteor as such was not so huge, but the impact of the collision is what let to the Meteor Crater being of these dimensions.
After the movie we walked around the museum seeing the pictures and reading amazing facts and history of the formation of the Crater. The most incredible thing in the museum (apart from the Crater itself of course) is The Fragment(as I call it). A fragment, a rather heavy(650Kgs) and large one was on display at the museum. Now here it comes - this fragment was a part of the meteor that hit the Earth 50,000 yrs ago, which broke off from an asteroid in a collision that took place half a billion years ago with another heavenly body, which in turn could have been part of a planet in our solar system that under went fragmentation millions or even billions of light years ago!! This trip was turning out to be more interesting than I thought it would be. I seemed to be loosing a lot of things that I never really gave much thought to. If I lost sense of scale and proportion at the Grand Canyon, I had totally lost sense of time here at the Meteor Crater, and still have not got it back. How is one supposed to imagine billions and billions of light years to get an idea if time? Here we are talking about a piece of rock that has actually travelled through several periods of time, through different worlds and here it is lying in a museum in Arizona as a result of a series of events that started occurring many billions of light years ago in some part of our solar system. To me that seems incredibly mind-boggling.
Apart from the fact that this fragment is from an alien planet and origin, this piece of metal rock could easily be one of the oldest things found on our planet today - billions of light years old, probably existing even before earth was formed. We touched and felt the cool metal that literally once belonged to another world and time. This was the closest I ever got to having a close encounter of a third kind! It was amazing once we think about it.
I wonder if we have a part in the Grand Scheme of things in this Universe even as small as a speck of dust. It makes me wonder how our actions small or big affects the Universe and whether they do put in motion a series of events that some how produce an effect later on some time, some where in this Universe. Judging from this experience, it makes me believe that they do.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
P.S. Some interesting definitions that the guide told us :
Meteoroid - rock fragments flying in space.
Meteor - any bright object, natural or man-made, flying through Earth's atmosphere.
Meteorite - Meteor after hitting the Earth's surface.(He agreed that as per this definition, the Crater is wrongly named. It should ideally be Meteorite Crater instead of Meteor Crater. But I guess they are keeping this name itself)
Comments
And more over, the trip parts are flowing... is there some more to go?
Geetha - the guide was not for us alone. just a person who came in to the theater after the movie was over and explained a few things.
Hugs,
Smita