The Steinheim crater is a meteorite crater in

Steinheim am Albuch Steinheim am Albuch is a municipality in the district of Heidenheim in Baden-Württemberg in southern Germany. Steinheim is known for its meteorite crater An impact crater is a circular depression in the surface of a solid astronomical o ...

, Heidenheim County,

Baden-Württemberg Baden-Württemberg (; ), commonly shortened to BW or BaWü, is a German state () in Southwest Germany, east of the Rhine, which forms the southern part of Germany's western border with France. With more than 11.07 million inhabitants across a ...

, Germany. The crater is located at the north-eastern end of the Swabian Alb, 40km west of the much larger (24-km-diameter)

Nördlinger Ries The Nördlinger Ries is an impact crater and large circular depression in western Bavaria and eastern Baden-Württemberg. It is located north of the Danube in the district of Donau-Ries. The city of Nördlingen is located within the depression, a ...

crater. It is 3.8 km in diameter and the age is estimated to be about 14.3 million years (

Miocene The Miocene ( ) is the first epoch (geology), geological epoch of the Neogene Period and extends from about (Ma). The Miocene was named by Scottish geologist Charles Lyell; the name comes from the Greek words (', "less") and (', "new") and mea ...

). The crater is exposed at the surface. It had previously been thought that the two craters formed simultaneously by the impact of a double asteroid 14.8 million years ago, but a study published in 2020 suggests that Steinheim could actually be about 500,000 years younger than Nördlinger Ries.J. Classen (1978)
A large crater field recognized in Central Europe
Bull. Ver. Schweiz. Petroleum-Geol. u.-Ing., Vol. 44, Nr. 106, April 1978.

References

* J. Baier, V. J. Sach: ''Shatter-Cones aus den Impaktkratern Nördlinger Ries und Steinheimer Becken''. In: ''Fossilien'', 35(2), Wiebelsheim 2018. * V. J. Sach & J. Baier: ''Neue Untersuchungen an Strahlenkalken und Shatter-Cones in Sediment- und Kristallingesteinen (Ries-Impakt und Steinheim-Impakt, Deutschland)''. Pfeil-Verlag, München 2017. . Impact craters of Germany Miocene impact craters Landforms of Baden-Württemberg South German Scarplands Basins of Germany Heidenheim (district) {{BadenWürttemberg-geo-stub