Chesapeake Bay impact crater
Okay, so you know how when you drop a rock in a pond, it makes ripples? Well, a really, REALLY long time ago, something much bigger than a rock fell from space and hit the Earth near a place called Chesapeake Bay.
It was like a giant, fiery explosion. And just like when you drop a rock in a pond, this explosion made ripples too. But instead of water ripples, it made big dents in the Earth.
The impact of this huge explosion made a crater – kind of like a giant hole in the ground. And this hole is really, really big – like, 35 miles wide. That's about as big as driving all the way around your whole town in one direction!
The Chesapeake Bay impact crater has been around for millions and millions of years, but we didn't even know it existed until scientists found evidence of it in the 1980s. People study this crater to learn more about how these kinds of collisions happen and what they can tell us about the history of our planet.
It was like a giant, fiery explosion. And just like when you drop a rock in a pond, this explosion made ripples too. But instead of water ripples, it made big dents in the Earth.
The impact of this huge explosion made a crater – kind of like a giant hole in the ground. And this hole is really, really big – like, 35 miles wide. That's about as big as driving all the way around your whole town in one direction!
The Chesapeake Bay impact crater has been around for millions and millions of years, but we didn't even know it existed until scientists found evidence of it in the 1980s. People study this crater to learn more about how these kinds of collisions happen and what they can tell us about the history of our planet.
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