[meteorite-list] Wolf Creek

From: Bernd Pauli HD <bernd.pauli_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Thu Apr 22 09:44:35 2004
Message-ID: <3AA13CB8.2F761859_at_lehrer1.rz.uni-karlsruhe.de>

Craig wrote:

> They were showing the view out of the plane, when lo and behold,
> Wolf Creek Crater came into view. They gave a brief description
> about the size and how it was formed "500,000 years ago".


Hello Craig and List,

The age of the crater is given by the terrestrial age obtained for the
IIIAB meteorite fragments that have been found as about 300,000
years based on 36 Cl /10Be and 41 Ca/36 Cl results.


Sky & Telescope - May 1999, p.14: 50 & 25 Years Ago

May 1949

On June 21, 1947, when flying over the Desert Basin south of Hall's
Creek [Australia] ... Frank Reeves, geologist, and N.B. Sauve,
geophysicist, ... were intrigued to see below them a perfectly shaped
crater ... "The crater was not marked on the map as such, but there is a
mark for a hill more or less in the exact location of the crater ... The
Commonwealth Bureau of Mineral Resources recognizes the resemblance of
the Wolf Creek crater to the Arizona crater and considers that it was
probably caused by a meteor[oid]. "
When this report was written, only two brief visits had been made to the
crater and no meteorites had been found. Subsequently, weathered pieces
of iron were discovered, some weighing more than 150 kilograms,
confirming the crater's celestial origin. Wolf Creek crater measures 853
meters across, and its floor lies 46 meters below the surrounding plain.


BUCHWALD V.F. (1975) Handbook of Iron
Meteorites, Vol. 3, pp. 1327-1329, excerpts:

A large circular crater - the most remarkable of the Australian craters
- was first observed from the air in June 1947, on the edge of the
essentially unexplored Great Sandy Desert. It is situated about 110 km
south of Hall's Creek from where it may be reached by dirt track in a
vehicle with 4-wheel drive ... The first descriptions by ground parties
came from Reeves & Chalmers (1949 Guppy & Mattheson (1950) and Cassidy
(1954). According to them, and to McCall (1965a), the crater is 850-900
m in diameter. The rim of the crater rises 18-30 m above the surrounding
plain and 48-54 m above the floor of the interior basin. The crater may
well have had a depth of 150-180 m prior to pervasion by gypsum and
Aeolian sand which now form the existing flat floor, where a vegetation
much more luxuriant than outside reflects the seasonal filling of the
crater with rain water.


Best wishes,

Bernd
Received on Sat 03 Mar 2001 01:49:28 PM PST