The Earth Impact Database is a database of confirmed

impact structure An impact structure is a generally circular or craterlike geologic structure of deformed bedrock or sediment produced by impact on a planetary surface, whatever the stage of erosion of the structure. In contrast, an impact crater is the surface e ...

s or

crater A crater is a landform consisting of a hole or depression (geology), depression on a planetary surface, usually caused either by an object hitting the surface, or by geological activity on the planet. A crater has classically been described ...

s on

Earth Earth is the third planet from the Sun and the only astronomical object known to Planetary habitability, harbor life. This is enabled by Earth being an ocean world, the only one in the Solar System sustaining liquid surface water. Almost all ...

. It was initiated in 1955 by the

Dominion Observatory The Dominion Observatory was an astronomical observatory in Ottawa, Ontario that operated from 1902 to 1970. The Observatory was also an institution within the Canadian Federal Government. The observatory grew out of the Department of the Inte ...

, Ottawa, under the direction of Carlyle S. Beals. Since 2001, it has been maintained as a not-for-profit source of information at the Planetary and Space Science Centre at the

University of New Brunswick The University of New Brunswick (UNB) is a public university with two primary campuses in Fredericton and Saint John, New Brunswick. It is the oldest English language, English-language university in Canada, and among the oldest public universiti ...

, Canada. , the database lists 190 confirmed impact sites. Other lists are wider in scope by including more than just confirmed sites, such as probable, possible, suspected and rejected or discredited impact sites on their lists. These are used for screening and tracking study of possible impact sites. Sites will appear first in these lists while under study and may be incorporated into UNB's Earth Impact Database after confirmation and collection of enough information about the site to satisfy the database's strict entry criteria. A previous list was maintained by the Impact Field Studies Group at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. The Catalogue of the Earth's Impact structures is maintained at the Siberian Center for Global Catastrophes.

References

External links

* * * {{Impact cratering on Earth Impact geology Online databases University of New Brunswick Scientific databases

See also

References

External links