University of the Free StateGeologists and archaeologists are working to examine ancient drawings found in the world’s largest impact crater A number of ancient animal carvings were miraculously discovered inside South Africa’s Vredefort Crater which is the largest confirmed impact crater on earth at 55 miles wide Scientists believed that the crater is a result of a giant asteroid impact from some two billion years ago the crater is believed to have been closer to 190 miles wide but has since shrunk due to erosion A team of international scientists has been working to examine the crater’s geological influences on the surrounding area and now believe that the crater is not only a site for geological and planetary significance but also for understanding the region’s first population of humans Newsweek reported that the carvings found in the section of the Vredefort Dome known as the “Rain Snake” depict a hippo and a rhino — all animals that were commonly found in the area some 8,000 years ago Researchers established that the markings were the handwork of the Khoi-San South Africa’s “First Peoples.” The drawings are believed to have served a role in rain-making ceremonies we recognize the special nature of the impact crater but it was also recognized by ancient inhabitants of the area,” said Matthew Huber a geographer at the University of the Free State in South Africa Huber added that since the markings were considered a significant archaeological finding he and his colleagues have enlisted the help of local archaeologists to uncover “exactly what was done at these sites and how it influenced the people that were there.” University of the Free StateThe Granophyre Dykes of the Vredefort Crater where the markings were found The ancient carvings appear on the exterior of stone structures inside the crater area known as The Granophyre Dykes which stretches six miles long and 16 feet wide and formed after impact The 8,000-year-old markings appear faded on the dyke’s red stone surface yet still clearly depict the shape of the region’s animals the dyke itself had formed a shape similar to that of a rain snake deity an important figure in Khoi-San culture with powers to summon rain According to archaeologists Shiona Moodley and Jens Kriek Khoi-San mythology believed in a three-tiered universe The top tier hosted their god and spirits of the dead the middle tier represented the material or physical world Snakes were believed to occupy all three realms and were believed to be creatures “of rain.” The asteroid which created the crater was likely between six and nine miles wide and traveling at almost 43,500 miles per hour when it hit the earth The impact area is southwest of present-day Johannesburg and is a half of a mile deep the exposed rocks at the site of the crater “preserve an almost continuous record spanning almost one-third of Earth’s history,” and now seems to preserve a chunk of human history Next, read five mysteries uncovered by Google Earth. And then, learn how giant craters opened up across Siberia’s “End of the Earth” peninsula The World Heritage Centre is at the forefront of the international community’s efforts to protect and preserve World Heritage partnerships for conservation Ensuring that World Heritage sites sustain their outstanding universal value is an increasingly challenging mission in today’s complex world where sites are vulnerable to the effects of uncontrolled urban development Our Partners Donate Take advantage of the search to browse through the World Heritage Centre information approximately 120 km south-west of Johannesburg is a representative part of a larger meteorite impact structure it is the oldest astrobleme yet found on Earth it is also the largest and the most deeply eroded Vredefort Dome bears witness to the world’s greatest known single energy release event which had devastating global effects including It provides critical evidence of the Earth’s geological history and is crucial to understanding of the evolution of the planet Despite the importance of impact sites to the planet’s history geological activity on the Earth’s surface has led to the disappearance of evidence from most of them and Vredefort is the only example to provide a full geological profile of an astrobleme below the crater floor à environ 120 km au sud-ouest de Johannesburg est une partie représentative de la structure d’impact d’une météorite de très grande taille c’est le plus ancien astroblème découvert sur Terre à ce jour c’est aussi le plus grand et le plus profondément érodé Le dôme de Vredefort est le témoin de la plus grande libération d’énergie jamais connue sur la planète ; elle a causé des changements planétaires dévastateurs des modifications majeures en termes d’évolution Le dôme constitue un témoignage très important de l’histoire géologique de la planète et tient une place fondamentale dans notre compréhension de l’évolution de la planète Les impacts de météorites ont joué un rôle important dans l’histoire de la Terre mais l’activité géologique à la surface de la planète a conduit à la disparition des traces de la plupart des sites d’impact Et le dôme de Vredefort est le seul exemple sur Terre qui fournisse un profil géologique complet d’un astroblème au-dessous du fond du cratère إن قبة فريدفورت الواقعة على مسافة 120 كلم جنوب غرب جوهانسبرغ هي جزء يدلّ على بنية الاصطدام التي أحدثها حجر نيزكي كبير الحجم بالأرض أو ندبة نيزكية إنها الندبة الأقدم على الأرض حتى أيامنا هذه وتعود إلى 2.023 مليون سنة خلت يبلغ شعاعها 190 كلم وهي الأكبر والأكثر تآكلاً تشهد قبة فريدفورت على أكبر عملية تحرير للطاقة عرفتها الكرة الأرضية فقد تسبب بتغييرات كونية مدمّرة من بينها، بحسب بعض العلماء، تغييرات كبيرة لجهة التطوّر تشكّل القبة شهادة مهمة عن تاريخ الكرة الأرضية الجيولوجي ولها مكانة كبيرة في فهمنا لتطوّر الكرة الأرضية لقد لعب اصطدام النيازك دوراً مهماً في تاريخ الأرض إلا أن النشاطات الجيولوجية على سطح الأرض قد أدّت إلى اختفاء آثار غالبية مواقع الاصطدام تبقى قبّة فريدفورت المثال الأوحد على الأرض الذي يقدّم سمةً جيولوجيةً كاملة لندبة نيزكية تحت حفرة 弗里德堡陨石坑距离约翰内斯堡西南方约120公里，是陨石撞击结构或陨石坑的具有代表性的景观，可以追溯到20.23亿年前，是迄今为止地球上发现的最古老的陨石坑，其半径为190公里，也是面积最大撞击程度最深的陨石坑。弗里德堡陨石坑证明了已知的世界上最大的能量释放事件，这次事件导致毁灭性的全球变化，一些科学家认为它还包括了主要的进化演变。它提供了地球地质史的重要证据，对了解地球进化至关重要。尽管地球表面的地质活动对地球的历史意义重大，但是也导致受撞击最严重的遗址证据的消失。弗里德堡陨石坑是地球上仅存的一处提供关于火口原以下的陨石坑的完整地质概况的遗址。 расположенный примерно в 120 км к юго-западу от Йоханнесбурга является представительным фрагментом крупной метеоритной импактной структуры это древнейшая астроблема из всех обнаруженных к настоящему времени на Земле это еще и самый крупный и наиболее обнаженный на глубину объект такого рода Вредефорт известен как след самого мощного в истории Земли метеоритного удара столкновение с метеоритом могло изменить весь ход развития нашей планеты Объект хранит ценнейшие свидетельства геологической истории Земли В результате произошедших в земной коре геологических изменений большинство древних метеоритных кратеров уже исчезло и на этом фоне Вредефорт является единственным на Земле объектом на котором доступен для непосредственного изучения геологический разрез астроблемы ниже её подошвы La bóveda de Vredefort se halla a unos 120 km al sudoeste de Johannesburgo y es un sitio representativo del impacto de un meteorito o astroblema El astroblema de Vredefort es el más antiguo (2.023 millones de años) el más grande (190 km de radio) y el más erosionado de todos los descubiertos en la Tierra Es un testimonio excepcional del fenómeno de liberación de energía más importante ocurrido en nuestro planeta provocó profundas alteraciones en la evolución un testimonio fundamental de la historia geológica y es esencial para comprender su evolución Los impactos de meteoritos desempeñaron un papel muy importante en la historia de la Tierra pero la actividad geológica en la superficie de ésta ha hecho desaparecer el rastro de la mayoría de ellos De ahí el carácter excepcional del sitio de Vredefort porque es el único de todo el mundo que ofrece un perfil geológico completo de un astroblema debajo del fondo del cráter The Vredefort Dome is 120 km south west from Johannesburg The property represents a unique geological phenomenon formed about 2 023 million years ago and is the oldest and largest known meteorite impact structure on earth geological strata comprising the middle to upper zones of the earth’s crust developed over a period of more than 3 200 million years are exposed All the classical related characteristics of a large astrobleme are found in the property This multi-ring structure formed by the impact scar illustrates the effect of shock metamorphism of rocks transformation of crystal structures and shatter cones of the immense force created by the impact Criterion (viii): Vredefort Dome is the oldest and most deeply eroded complex meteorite impact structure in the world It is the site of the world’s greatest single It contains high quality and accessible geological (outcrop) sites which demonstrate a range of geological evidences of a complex meteorite impact structure The rural and natural landscapes of the serial property help portray the magnitude of the ring structures resulting from the impact The serial nomination is considered to be a representative sample of a complex meteorite impact structure A comprehensive comparative analysis with other complex meteorite impact structures demonstrated that it is the only example on earth providing a full geological profile of an astrobleme below the crater floor thereby enabling research into the genesis and development of an astrobleme immediately post impact The serial World Heritage property which is about 30,111 ha is made up of a main component area of 30,108 ha and 3 satellite components of 1 ha each The property of the Vredefort Dome includes key geological (outcrop) sites which demonstrate classic complex meteorite impact structure phenomena This serial property is surrounded by a 5 km buffer zone that is designed to ensure the property’s long term protection against external development threats Provision of legal protection and the establishment and maintenance of an effective management system involving all relevant stakeholders are essential requirements for this property The national World Heritage Convention Act of 1999 is to be applied to the World Heritage property following the completion of the national designation process Various legal instruments are also applicable to ensure the protection of the property: These pieces of legislation include the Environmental Conservation Act(Act No the National Environmental Management Act(Act No the Subdivision of Agricultural Land Act(Act No 70 of 1970) National Environmental Management Biodiversity Act(Act No 10 of 2004) and the Free State Nature Conservation Ordinance(Ord all development within or outside the property is subjected to an environmental impact assessment Once the World Heritage Convention Act also applies to this property it will automatically be recognized as a protected area in terms of the National Environmental Management: Protected Areas (Act 57 of 2003) Protection in terms of the latter legislation also implies that mining or prospecting will be completely prohibited within the property or its buffer zone The management of the property is to be guided by a multi-stakeholder Vredefort Dome Steering Committee and carried out on an interim basis by the Vredefort Dome Inter-Provincial Task Team A framework defining roles and responsibilities is required The future Management Authority is to oversee the implementation of the integrated management plan taking into account the existing State Party’s action plan and draft management guidelines regarding the coordination of land-uses presentation and visitation of this World Heritage property An integrated management plan is required for the serial property so as to address the critical issues of the enforcement of the special land use planning requirements for the private property farmlands within the serial property the preservation of the aesthetic rural/natural landscape and the protection presentation of and public access to the clearly defined key satellite components These conditions are essential to ensure that active conservation management is possible June 27, 2018JPEG an asteroid measuring at least 10 kilometers across hurtled toward Earth The impact occurred southwest of what is now Johannesburg and temporarily made a 40-kilometer-deep and 100-kilometer-wide dent in the surface the crater widened and shallowed as the rock below started to rebound and the walls collapsed The world’s oldest and largest known impact structure was formed Scientists estimate that when the rebound and collapse ceased Vredefort Crater measured somewhere between 180 and 300 kilometers wide But more than 2 billion years of erosion has made the exact size hard to pin down “If you consider that the original impact crater was a shallow bowl like you would serve food in and you were able to slice horizontally through the bowl progressively you would see that the bowl’s diameter will decrease with each slice you take off,” said Roger Gibson of University of the Witwatersrand and an expert on impact processes we are unable to categorically fix where the edge now lies.” Notice that only part of the ring is visible That’s because areas to the south have been paved over by rock formations that are less than 300 million years old The young rock formations have begotten fertile soils that are intensely cultivated The darker ring in the center of this image has shallow soils with steep terrain not suitable for farming Along the ridges in the Mountainland you can see white lines: these are the hardest layers of rock The outer part of Mountainland has exposed rocks that are roughly 2.8 billion years old; this is the Central Rand Group source of more than one-third of all gold mined on Earth Visitors to the impact site today can witness geologic time by traversing just 50 kilometers from Potchefstroom toward Vredefort The journey would take you from shallow crustal sedimentary rocks deposited between 2.5 and 2.1 billion years ago ending with 3.1- to 3.5-billion-year-old granites and remnants of ocean crust that were once about 25 kilometers below Earth’s surface “Such exposed crustal sections are incredibly rare on Earth,” Gibson said “The added bonus here is that the rocks preserve an almost continuous record spanning almost one-third of Earth’s history.” NASA Earth Observatory image by Lauren Dauphin, using Landsat data from the U.S. Geological Survey View this area in EO Explorer The world’s oldest and largest known impact structure shows some of the most extreme deformation conditions known on Earth Upheaval Dome is a striking geologic structure in the Canyonlands National Park of southern Utah The alternating rock layers make a nearly circular 5.5-kilometer- (3.4-mile-) diameter “bull’s-eye.” This photograph of Upheaval Dome was taken by an astronaut onboard the International Space Station The oblique viewing angle—in other words not looking straight down—provides a sense of the topography within and around the structure The dome appears more like an ellipse than a circle due to the oblique viewing perspective The dark green Unia River highlights the circular structure of the Wembo-Nyama feature—a possible impact crater in the Democratic Republic of Congo—in this natural-color image from April 1 Spider Crater rests in a depression some 13 by 11 kilometers (8 by 7 miles) across Meteorite craters often have central areas of uplift Spider Crater sits in a depression and has a central uplift area characteristic of impact craters The crater was formed by a meteor impact less than 70 million years ago during the “Age of Dinosaurs.” crashing into the planet in an area near present-day Johannesburg The impactor—most likely an asteroid—formed what is today the biggest crater on our planet was formed by an object about 15 kilometers (approximately 9.3 miles) in diameter that was travelling at a velocity of 15 kilometers per second But according to new research from the University of Rochester, the impactor may have been much bigger—and would have had devastating consequences across the planet. This research, published in the Journal of Geophysical Research provides a more accurate understanding of the large impact and will allow researchers to better simulate impact events on Earth and other planets “Having access to the information provided by a structure like the Vredefort crater is a great opportunity to test our model and our understanding of the geologic evidence so we can better understand impacts on Earth and beyond.” This makes it difficult for scientists to directly estimate the size of the crater at the time of the original impact and therefore the size and velocity of the impactor that formed the crater An object that is 15 kilometers in size and traveling at a velocity of 15 kilometers per second would produce a crater about 172 kilometers in diameter this is much smaller than current estimates for the Vredefort crater These current estimates are based on new geological evidence and measurements estimating that the structure’s original diameter would have been between 250 and 280 kilometers (approximately 155 and 174 miles) during the time of the impact and their colleagues conducted simulations to match the updated size of the crater Their results showed that an impactor would have to be much larger—about 20 to 25 kilometers—and traveling at a velocity of 15 to 20 kilometers per second to explain a crater 250 kilometers in size This means the impactor that formed the Vredefort crater would have been larger than the asteroid that killed off the dinosaurs 66 million years ago in addition to causing the Cretaceous-Paleogene extinction event that killed the dinosaurs If the Vredefort crater was even larger and the impact more energetic than that which formed the Chicxulub crater the Vredefort impact may have caused even more catastrophic global consequences the Vredefort impact did not leave a record of mass extinction or forest fires given that there were only single-cell lifeforms and no trees existed two billion years ago,” Nakajima says the impact would have affected the global climate potentially more extensively than the Chicxulub impact did.” Dust and aerosols from the Vredefort impact would have spread across the planet and blocked sunlight “This could have had a devastating effect on photosynthetic organisms After the dust and aerosols settled—which could have taken anywhere from hours to a decade—greenhouse gases such as cardon dioxide that were emitted from the impact would have raised the global temperature potentially by several degrees for a long period of time.” The simulations also allowed the researchers to study the material ejected by the impact and the distance the material traveled from the crater They can use this information to determine the geographic locations of land masses billions of years ago previous research determined material from the impactor was ejected to present-day Karelia the distance of the land mass containing Karelia would have been only 2,000 to 2,500 kilometers from the crater in South Africa—much closer than the two areas are today “It is incredibly difficult to constrain the location of landmasses long ago,” Allen says “The current best simulations have mapped back about a billion years and uncertainties grow larger the further back you go Clarifying evidence such as this ejecta layer mapping may allow researchers to test their models and help complete the view into the past.” The idea for this paper arose as part of a final for the course Planetary Interiors (now named Physics of Planetary Interiors) Allen says the experience of having undergraduate work result in a peer-reviewed journal article was very rewarding and helped her when applying for graduate school “When Professor Nakajima approached me and asked if I wanted to work together to turn it into a publishable work it was really gratifying and validating,” Allen says and it was seen as compelling enough to another scientist that they thought it was worth publishing!” “This project was way outside of my usual research comfort zone but I thought it would be a great learning experience and would force me to apply my skills in a new way It gave me a lot of confidence in my research abilities as I prepared to go to graduate school.” Moons may yield clues to what makes planets habitable University of Rochester scientist Miki Nakajima turns to computer simulations of moon formations New data about asteroid surfaces will help explorers touch down safely Rochester researchers from across departments worked to improve the accuracy of data collected from the surfaces of asteroids How did Earth avoid a Mars-like fate? Ancient rocks hold cluesNew paleomagnetic research suggests Earth’s solid inner core formed 550 million years ago and restored our planet’s magnetic field Eos sheds light on how the planet’s crust reequilibrates after a massive impact “What we’re looking at now is what the structure looks like very deep below the impact.” Get the most fascinating science news stories of the week in your inbox every Friday “We don’t have any other large impact craters where we get to see what it looks like when you slice into it.” And because these dikes are still visible today despite extensive erosion impact melt must have traveled far below the surface “Why do we have these dikes deep in the subsurface That’s the overarching research question,” said Huber But the duration of such ground shaking has never been constrained And that’s an important quantity to understand because it gets at a fundamental question: Is an impact event a one-and-done affair or do aftereffects continue to roil a region for some time “Crustal settling over geologic time has always been suspected around large impact basins, but the duration of that settling has been elusive,” said David Kring a planetary geologist at the Lunar and Planetary Institute in Houston not involved in the research “The current paper attempts to resolve that issue.” Huber and his colleagues studied five dikes Three appeared to be homogeneous across their exposed faces even at first glance: Their interiors were dark brown and their peripheries tended to be lighter in color and flecked with beige “The boundaries between the phases are quite sharp—you can put your finger on the precise contact between them,” Huber told Eos the researchers found that the two visually striking dikes were chemically inhomogeneous: Their interiors contained a higher fraction of iron and magnesium and their peripheries tended to be dominated by silicon and potassium This finding suggests that two chemically distinct pulses of impact melt poured downward to form these dikes And that’s possible only if the melt sheet chemically differentiated between the two pulses which in turn implies that some interval of time separated episodes of ground shaking “Even tens of thousands of years after an impact you would not want to be building a house on the periphery of a crater.” The first downpouring of impact melt must have occurred before the melt sheet differentiated and the second had to have taken place after differentiation but before the melt sheet solidified On the basis of previous estimates of the timing of those events made by other researchers Huber and his colleagues concluded that earthquakes shook the region for at least tens of thousands of years This finding reveals the enduring nature of massive impact events Even tens of thousands of years after an impact —Katherine Kornei (@KatherineKornei) Please check your email and enter your one time pin below:   Open in Gmail Sorry there was an error loading the audio the rocks appear to slither across the veld like a giant snake and that might hold the key to the mystery of why these boulders were chosen for a special purpose a long time ago Etched across these rocks are engravings of animals. There is a hippo, black rhino, Eland and mythical beasts. Researchers are still trying to understand their purpose.advertisementDon't want to see this? Remove ads The world first learnt about this location when the rock art was revealed in 2019 with pictures of the engravings appearing in the international press There is still much to learn about the site This ancient art is located near the hills that ring the Vredefort dome – the spot where a meteorite smashed into the earth two billion years ago the Vaal River meanders through this corner of the northern Free State It is the river that perhaps provides clues as to why the San made these engravings suggests that this site might have been part of a rain-making ritual (Photo: Supplied by the National Museum Bloemfontein) “In these engravings you see large animals and there will be a reason each of these animals are there,” says Shiona Moodley head of the rock art department at the National Museum in Bloemfontein The proximity to the Vaal suggests the area was a place where hunter-gatherers would perform rituals to ensure the return of the rains “It does seem that a lot of the images of big animals, like hippos, rhinos and that sort of thing, do relate to rain and rain-making practices,” explains Prof David Pearce, director of Wits University’s Rock Art Research Institute. He says little research has been done on engravings, in comparison to painted rock art.advertisementDon't want to see this? Remove ads “The San believe they can enter a trance and find the rain animal and lure it out of its water hole… then they would slice its throat and the blood will fall as rain,” Moodley explains She has yet to write an academic paper about this particular site and is reluctant to speculate too much about the purpose of the engravings It was during a field study led by geologists from the University of the Free State that Moodley was called on to examine the site The ‘Rain snake’ dyke is believed to have been formed by a molten sheet of rock two billion years ago when the meteorite struck This is perhaps the only dyke in the world that has rock art on it There is no organic material such as paint pigments left on the rock that can be analysed and dated through the use of Carbon 14 radioisotopes What researchers find unique about the site is that the art is found along 700 metres of a granophyre dyke, a geological formation that extends for about nine kilometres.advertisementDon't want to see this? Remove ads Known as the “rain snake” dyke, it was believed to have been formed by a molten sheet of rock that erupted when the Vredefort meteorite smashed into the earth.advertisementDon't want to see this? Remove ads Since a snake is also considered a “rain animal” it might have been why these hunter-gatherers decided to use the line of black rocks as their canvas “This is probably the only dyke in the world There are examples of rock engravings across South Africa with one of the best known sites being Wildebeest Kuil near Kimberley in Northern Cape province archaeologists have found 400 engravings of large animals including hippo where San hunter-gatherers left an array of engraved images on the rocks And while not much is known about the engravings what is interesting is that there are signs that people from that time interacted with the art “With the engravings, people seem to do things to them. People come back to them at different points and cut them. You often see lines cut across them [the animals], often the rib cages of bigger animals,” says Pearce.advertisementDon't want to see this? Remove ads “You get patches on rocks where people have just been hammering them We think with engravings there is more of an auditory component to it.” These engravings could have been part of rituals that involved dance “A lot of engraved sites are what you call Gong rocks. If you get the right sort of rock, and it is balanced on another rock in a particular sort of way, you can bang it and it rings like a bell. And with a lot of these you can see marks where they have been bashed.”advertisementDon't want to see this? Remove ads The hope is that further research might one day provide a better understanding of why these early people chose such an unusual rock formation to spend time chiselling out images of wild animals.  “This is what is both frustrating and really exciting about rock art in this country… there is just so much out there. The problem is that there are just not enough hands,” says Pearce. DM ‘Not only did the 1,064 locomotives contract skyrocket by R16-billion, the trains CRRC ultimately delivered were late and of poor quality. Only 249 of the 359 locomotives have been delivered and these are largely defective and useless prototypes. ‘ Excellent research. Where is the accountability? I was going to say thanks for a very interesting article but maybe I’m on the wrong track. Interesting article, but the hunter-gatherers in question probably didn’t have access to Google Earth to see the dyke resembling a large snake and “decided to use the line of black rocks as their canvas”. ' + scriptOptions._localizedStrings.webview_notification_text + ' " + scriptOptions._localizedStrings.redirect_overlay_title + " " + scriptOptions._localizedStrings.redirect_overlay_text + " Vredefort’s water treatment plant finds itself once again in a dire state highlighted after an oversight by the Democratic Alliance (DA) amidst mounting complaints by residents of Ngwathe Local Municipality about water shortages highlighted the negligence in maintenance and process control Two crucial sedimentation dams are now overflowing with sludge persisting despite a substantial investment the year before last reveals a systemic issue with Vredefort’s water purification capacity Despite efforts to renew and enhance the water plant water quality remains compromised due to sporadic negligence in essential processes by operators residents were unexpectedly supplied with “semi-purified water” from their taps following the depletion of chemical cleaners The lack of urgent communication with residents and councillors is not only unprofessional but also poses significant health risks Council members have been met with silence and evasion in response to their inquiries urging residents to boil tap water before consumption The failure to promptly notify the community about the depletion of chemical cleaners signifies a gross dereliction of duty by the Water Manager The DA officially complained with the acting Municipal Manager Attempts to reach the municipality’s Water Manager and Mayor via telephone have been unsuccessful the matter has been escalated to the Free State Department of Water Affairs To address the urgent water crisis in Vredefort the DA will present a concise set of proposals to senior officials immediately informed by recent visits to the water plant and consultation with external water experts offer practical solutions that can be swiftly implemented at minimal or no cost registered non profit organisation in South AfricaReg No: 011-895 NPO Home | South Africa Consumer protection officers from the Department of Economic Development in the Free State have confiscated expired counterfeit and illicit goods from various shops owned by foreign nationals in Vredefort This follows the death of two siblings aged three and four who allegedly consumed expired snacks Among the confiscated items were unbranded snacks with no clear expiry date counterfeit and illicit cigarettes as well as counterfeit sanitary pads The death of two siblings in Vredefort has the community of up in arms Some members of the community joined government officials to raid various shops in the town A storeroom at the back of one of shops was flooded with water and declared unsanitary by officials A meteorite impact is a colossal disruption—think intense ground shaking, sediments launching skyward, and enormous tsunamis But evidence of all that mayhem can be erased by erosion over time Scientists have now relied on clever geological sleuthing to discover impact ejecta near South Africa’s Vredefort impact structure the site of a massive meteorite strike roughly 2 billion years ago These ejecta might hold clues about the composition of the object that slammed into Earth during the Precambrian The Vredefort impact structure, near Johannesburg, is estimated to be between 180 and 300 kilometers in diameter—it’s believed to be the largest impact structure on Earth It’s far too old—and therefore too eroded—to have preserved that characteristic signature of an impact What’s visible instead is an arc of uplifted sediments. That material is part of the “peak ring” that formed within the original crater Such uplifted material is the calling card of a massive impact a geologist at the University of the Western Cape in Cape Town But even these uplifted sediments were buried far below Earth’s surface at the time of the impact “This [area] has experienced at least 10 kilometers of erosion there’s no hope of finding impact ejecta—sediments launched during an impact which have often been altered by high temperatures and pressures—within the impact structure itself To search for this so-called proximal ejecta, Huber and his colleagues looked a few hundred kilometers to the west. They focused on a swath of the Kaapvaal Craton, a geologic feature that, like other cratons around the world The researchers collected material from a pair of sediment cores originally drilled by mining companies exploring the region for iron and manganese Huber and his collaborators honed in on sediments dated to be 1.9 billion to 2.2 billion years old and assembled several thin sections of the rocks to analyze The sediments exhibited telltale signs of a violent event “There’s no doubt that it is impact ejecta.” Huber and his colleagues also spotted parallel lines running through grains of quartz. These lines, known as planar deformation features represent broken atomic bonds in the quartz’s crystal lattice Ordinary geologic processes like earthquakes or volcanic eruptions are rarely powerful enough to create these features “These grains were subjected to a shock wave.” Planar deformation features are “unequivocal evidence” of impact material, said Elmar Buchner a geologist at the Neu-Ulm University of Applied Sciences in Neu-Ulm “There’s no doubt that it is impact ejecta.” These results were presented today at the 84th Annual Meeting of the Meteoritical Society in Chicago There’s a lot more to learn from these ejecta The team next plans to analyze their samples for “impact melt,” material preserved from the time of the impact that’s sometimes a chemical amalgam of the impactor and the surrounding target rocks Such ejecta could help reveal the composition of the object responsible for creating the Vredefort impact structure “We are already planning our next analyses,” said Huber —Katherine Kornei (@KatherineKornei) Kornei, K. (2021), Ejecta discovered near site of ancient meteorite impact, Eos, 102, https://doi.org/10.1029/2021EO161880. Published on 17 August 2021. The MEC for the Free State Department of Economic indicated during his budget debate that the Department will be investing a further R15 million in the Vredefort Dome complex Yesterday I carried out an oversight visit to the Vredefort Dome heritage site to assess the current state of this complex after a previous visit last year The R24 million investment by taxpayers at Vredefort The buildings at the UNESCO world heritage site were meant to house educational scientific and cultural centres to promote local and international tourism to the Ngwathe Municipality These buildings cannot be used since they were built on granite which is allegedly crumbling due to poor planning The site where a meteorite struck the earth 2 023 million years ago leaving a dome with a 190 km radius was meant to have economic benefits for the community of Vredefort and surrounding towns in both the Free State and North-West Provinces This astrobleme (meteorite crater) is known to be the world’s greatest known energy release event This important heritage site has huge local and international tourism potential for the Free State province The DA will continue to promote the effective use of the Vredefort Dome that has the potential to generate employment generating investment for the local community of Ngwathe municipality The DA has submitted questions to MEC Mohale to determine how the R15 million to reinvigorate this project will be spent and what forms of inter-provincial co-operation will take place within this dome Futurity is your source of research news from leading universities You are free to share this article under the Attribution 4.0 International license The impactor that formed the Vredefort crater was probably much bigger than previously believed—and would have had devastating consequences that an object about 15 kilometers (approximately 9.3 miles) in diameter that was traveling at a velocity of 15 kilometers per second formed the impact structure This research, published in the Journal of Geophysical Research, provides a more accurate understanding of the large impact and will allow researchers to better simulate impact events on Earth and other planets “Understanding the largest impact structure that we have on Earth is critical,” says Natalie Allen based on research she conducted as an undergraduate student with Miki Nakajima an assistant professor of earth and environmental sciences at the University of Rochester who is now a PhD student at Johns Hopkins University “Having access to the information provided by a structure like the Vredefort crater is a great opportunity to test our model and our understanding of the geologic evidence so we can better understand impacts on Earth and beyond.” An object that is 15 kilometers in size and traveling at a velocity of 15 kilometers per second would produce a crater about 172 kilometers (about 106 miles) in diameter These current estimates are based on new geological evidence and measurements estimating that the structure’s original diameter would have been between 250 and 280 kilometers (approximately 155 and 174 miles) during the time of the impact If the Vredefort crater was even larger and the impact more energetic than that which formed the Chicxulub crater, the Vredefort impact may have caused even more catastrophic global consequences “Unlike the Chicxulub impact, the Vredefort impact did not leave a record of mass extinction or forest fires given that there were only single-cell lifeforms and no trees existed two billion years ago,” Nakajima says. “However, the impact would have affected the global climate potentially more extensively than the Chicxulub impact did.” “This could have had a devastating effect on photosynthetic organisms After the dust and aerosols settled—which could have taken anywhere from hours to a decade—greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide that were emitted from the impact would have raised the global temperature potentially by several degrees for a long period of time.” “It is incredibly difficult to constrain the location of landmasses long ago,” Allen says “The current best simulations have mapped back about a billion years Clarifying evidence such as this ejecta layer mapping may allow researchers to test their models and help complete the view into the past.” Source: University of Rochester Add your information below to receive daily updates An official website of the United States government Learn about updates on NSF priorities and the agency's implementation of recent executive orders The impactor — most likely an asteroid — formed what is today the biggest crater on the planet provides a more accurate understanding of the large impact and will allow scientists to better simulate impact events on Earth and other planets That makes it difficult for scientists to directly estimate the size of the crater at the time of the original impact the size and velocity of the impactor that formed the crater The current estimates are based on new geological evidence and measurements estimating that the structure's original diameter would have been between 250 and 280 kilometers (approximately 155 and 174 miles) during the time of the impact The scientists conducted simulations to match the updated size of the crater Their results showed that an impactor would have to be much larger — about 20 to 25 kilometers — and traveling at a velocity of 15 to 20 kilometers per second to explain a crater 250 kilometers in size "This team has used a modern approach to obtain new insights into the environment of the early Earth," says Justin Lawrence a program director in NSF's Division of Earth Sciences "The findings may lead to better prediction of the potential effects of impactors in the future and the consequences for global climate." Sign up for email updates The Vredefort crater was birthed 2 billion years ago when the largest asteroid ever to hit Earth impacted the planet A new study suggests the gargantuan space rock was even bigger than previously predicted large parts of the Vredefort crater are barely recognizable as an impact structure The destructive space rock was somewhere between 12.4 and 15.5 miles wide scientists thought the Vredefort crater was originally much smaller — around 107 miles (172 km) wide researchers previously calculated that the asteroid responsible for the impact would have measured around 9.3 miles (15 km) across and collided at a speed of around 33,500 mph (53,900 km/h) scientists have revisited the crater's measurements and gained new insight into the size of the enormous space rock Related: Could an asteroid destroy Earth?  In the study, which was published online Aug. 8 in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Planets researchers recalculated the size of the Vredefort asteroid and found that the destructive space rock likely measured somewhere between 12.4 and 15.5 miles (20 and 25 km) across and could have been traveling between 45,000 and 56,000 mph (72,000 and 90,000 km/h) when it struck our planet Get the world’s most fascinating discoveries delivered straight to your inbox scientists have struggled to pin down the original size of the Vredefort crater due to its erosion over the past 2 billion years.  "If you slice horizontally through the bowl progressively you would see that the bowl's diameter will decrease with each slice you take off." In addition to the natural erosion of the Vredefort impact structure newer rock formations have emerged atop parts of the crater most of the crater's original structure has been completely covered by younger rocks and only small sections of the crater's elevated rim are visible today making it even harder to tell how big the crater used to be other recent studies have estimated the Vredefort crater's size by focusing on minerals surrounding the crater scientists have spotted deformations and shock fractures in crystals that were caused by the ancient impact and thereby expand the known radius of the blast the researchers are confident that their new estimate for the size of the Vredefort asteroid is more accurate than previous estimates Related: World's oldest meteor crater isn't what it seems Based on the revised calculations of the Vredefort crater's original size the new study suggests that the Vredefort asteroid was likely around twice as large as the dinosaur-killer It also may have been traveling much faster so its impact would have been even more severe — potentially the single largest energy-release event in Earth's history there is scant evidence of the blast's ground-shaking power and the effects of the collision on the planet.  —Scientists uncover the largest crater on Earth under 100,000 years old —Did the asteroid that wiped out the dinosaurs have a sibling? Crater in West Africa hints maybe. —This long-lost asteroid impact was so big, its debris left more than 30 craters  the Vredefort impact did not leave a record of mass extinction or forest fires given that there were only single-cell lifeforms and no trees existed two billion years ago," study co-author Miki Nakajima a planetary scientist at the University of Rochester in New York the impact would have affected the global climate potentially more extensively than the Chicxulub impact did." continuing to study Vredefort crater could be the only way researchers learn more about this cataclysmic impact La Niña is dead — what that means for this year's hurricanes and weather El Cono: The mysterious sacred 'pyramid' hidden deep in the Amazon rainforest Bone collector caterpillar: The very hungry caterpillar of your nightmares a meteorite around 10km (6 miles) in diameter smashed into the earth Yet far from trumpeting it as a major tourist attraction officials have been accused of allowing the site to fall into ruin A visitor centre was built six years ago but never opened The roads around the dome are badly maintained shadow tourism minister for the opposition Democratic Alliance said on Thursday: “The mismanagement of Vredefort Dome given its significance in our nation and how visitors to our country and domestic tourists perceive it “Unesco declared the dome a world heritage site in 2005 and promised it would be protected by the international heritage convention after it was proclaimed by the government and given legal protection This proclamation has not been enforced stringently enough of late.” The impact at the site in what is now Parys was many times greater than anything the world’s entire nuclear arsenal could produce biggest and most deeply eroded complex meteorite impact structure on earth The Vredefort site is better preserved than other meteorite craters and offers invaluable evidence of the earth’s geological history The dome is only the central part of the impact crater It is known as a dome because the rock layers were bent into the shape of an inverted bowl 90km across “inaugurated with much fanfare in August 2008” “which is probably – but sadly – a good thing as it had begun to collapse prior to admitting the first visitor” a publication of the Geological Society of South Africa The centre has suffered water damage because of leaks during thunderstorms Most of the planned exhibits are still in storage at Wits University in Johannesburg and visitors’ movements are restricted by private fencing and poor-quality roads Reimold added: “Official ignorance and mismanagement have resulted in the complete breakdown of development in this world-renowned site.” Roger Gibson professor of structural geology and metamorphic petrology at Wits University in Johannesburg was commissioned in 2009 to develop an exhibition to fill the centre “This would be only the fifth impact-cratering-focused museum in the world and the only one in the southern hemisphere,” he said “Samples and materials have been donated from all over the world by the impact-cratering scientific community which is very enthusiastic about this project before we could start installing the exhibition flaws in the building rendered it unsafe and we’ve been in limbo ever since.” Some of the granite thrown up to the surface by the impact 2bn years ago Photograph: Andy Nixon/Getty Images/Gallo ImagesGibson described it as “arguably one of the top 10 geological wonders of the world” and said it is “most certainly under-utilised” for education and tourism The Vredefort Dome is not the only heritage site in South Africa in need of rehabilitation a geologist at the University of Pretoria and former member of the Geological Society’s site preservation committee said: “It’s a really big problem in South Africa The moment you label and advertise and promote something You put up a sign and it gets stolen for scrap metal.” Dixon, who enjoyed fleeting fame as an expert witness at the Oscar Pistorius murder trial last year there are not enough people sufficiently interested in these things to make them continually sustained and viable The Bankenveld region is not only home to wonderful highveld grasslands but also a group of very active honorary rangers (HR) The region is situated in the North West Province and although no national park falls within this region a world heritage site with significant biodiversity and several endemic species The Bankenveld region consists of 13 members of whom 10 have been HRs for longer than 10 years two of whom come from previously disadvantaged communities One of these new applicants is a teacher at Sei-phemelo High School in Ikageng and runs several environmental projects with a large group of previously disadvantaged teenagers The members have a wide range of areas of experience and expertise Since no national park falls within the region the group focuses mainly on community awareness of nature conservation The fact that the Potchefstroom campus of the North West University is within close proximity The HRs limit formal meetings to four a year and focus on outdoor opportunities for training learning about nature and teaching the public to appreciate the unique environment that is the Bankenveld Region The region's HRs have offered the Applied Communications Course several times and offer frequent Sense Active Awareness Walks in the Vredefort Dome for school children It is their hope that some of these children will become junior rangers (JR) At least once a year they make use of the expertise available in Potchefstroom to offer a course on grass or tree identification they run an exhibition on nature conservation and the role of HRs at the Potchefstroom Spring Festival every year The members of Bankenveld have designed and printed their own series of posters dealing with conservation national parks and the national projects and activities of the HRs The Bankenveld corps renders services all over the country Members often have valuable and interesting tales to tell and new things to teach their fellow participants This year started off with an indoor general meeting In February the HRs ventured to the animal breeding centre in Lichtenburg Children of a close-by school joined the group as friends of the centre In March three groups of teenage boys were taken into the Vredefort Dome for a Sense Active Awareness Walk John Botha first did an introductory talk before HRs and applicants teamed up to take boys out in small groups Whitey van Pletsen is a keen birder and loves to share his knowledge of bird ringing with children April was time for a general meeting in the public library once more The members and applicants learned about malaria and bilharzia from Dr Kennè de Kock "For the rest of the meeting we dealt with business and preparations for the Indaba to come." Still to come is learning about bat ear-fox aardvark and aardwolf conservation with a group of children an alien invasive plant workshop in the Dome a tree identification course and many more activities with teenagers large motor cycles and working with bonsai trees He has offered the Applied Communications Course for several years and will soon be qualified to offer the new Hospitality Course in our region and often takes the lead when we offer courses to the public," says Christien Terblanche is a business man and a forensic investigator He has 18 years' police experience with specific focus on fraud Neels Buitendag is the treasurer of Bankenveld and also a pharmacist and the other members can often listen to his experiences when he rendered service there and he does whatever it takes to promote conservation and often assists people in his quiet manner." Secretary is a technician in a laboratory for electron microscopy where she helps students and lecturers with their research "In her calm way Wilna keeps our region meticulously organised She is the mother figure and mentor for all the children who become involved and for applicants she is a volunteer for Famsa and secretary of Child Welfare in Potchefstroom cooking (and we testify that she does this well!) and gardening Her family and creating a home is very important to her She loves hiking and has completed several of the big routes such as the Fish River Canyon and the Otter involved with anything that concerns nature Heritage Month is celebrated annually in September It recognises aspects of South African culture which are both tangible and intangible: creative expression such as music and performances the food we eat as well as the popular memory Various heritage sites and infrastructures in South Africa are named after the liberation struggle icons South Africa is also home to eight of the 981 World Heritage Sites which are recognised by the United Nations Educational and Scientific Organisation as places of outstanding cultural and historical importance The sites offer a diversity and abundance of cultural and natural values that encapsulate the value systems of the country “The place of wisdom” as Mapungubwe is known is situated in the Limpopo province The site lies on the open savannah of the Mapungubwe National Park at the convergence of the Limpopo and Shashe Rivers It touches the northern border of South Africa This is a site that was populated by a civilised kingdom over 900 years back artefacts and graves of these communities can be seen at the site It also has a national park where various bird and animal species For more information contact Mapungubwe: 015 534 7923/24 Vredefort DomeVredefort Dome was declared a heritage site in 2005 Some two billion years ago a meteorite 10 kilometres in diameter hit the earth about 100km southwest of Johannesburg near the town of Vredefort in the Free State Cradle of HumankindKnown in South Africa as the Cradle of Humankind Kromdraai and environs has one of the world's richest concentrations of hominid fossils evidence of human evolution over the last 3.5 million years It was declared a heritage site in 1999 and 2005 Found in the provinces of Gauteng and North West the fossil sites cover an area of 47 000 hectares For more information contact Cradle of Humankind: 014 577 9000 the country has 17 national heritage sites and the country is taking steps to protect more of its heritage sites Lieliesleaf FarmGovernment has set in motion the process of declaring another historic place in the history of South Africa Speaking at the 50th commemoration of the Liliesleaf Farm raid by the apartheid police President Jacob Zuma said preserving the site would contribute to the on-going process of national healing and the building of a more cohesive society So join in and help preserve and spread awareness of our heritage resources but they are the foundation for our future as well Great progress has been instrumental in ensuring that our cultural institutions portray South Africa’s diverse history Our heritage gives us a sense of identity and belonging Police in the Free State are investigating a case of murder and house robbery following the murder of a well-known cattle farmer on his farm near Vredefort The 71-year-old Dirk Steenkamp was allegedly inspecting a water pump on his farm not far from his house yesterday at 07:00 when he was overpowered by an unknown number of suspects told OFM News the attackers fled the scene with Steenkamp's cellphone and weapon.  alerted the police and various farmers.  farmers acted swiftly and in collaboration with the police It is alleged that the attackers arrived on the farm with a car in which they also fled the scene  A reliable source told OFM News it is believed that Steenkamp put up a fight with his attackers before he was shot.  OFM News/Mark Steenbok & Christal-Lize Muller  Have your say: Public hearings on key bills in the Free State Motsoaledi belê vergadering nadat USAID-besnoeiings MIV-klinieke tref Welkom-verdagtes gevonnis vir poging tot moord op polisieman, meisie Police crackdown continues with more road blocks in Free State ‘Barking mad’ economy putting strain on SPCA Oekraïne vra Suid-Afrika om ontvoerde kinders te help terugbring Wyle pous Franciskus het begrafnisrituele vooraf vereenvoudig Mianmar-aardbewing: Hulp stroom in ná meer as 1 700 sterftes Suid-Afrikaners wen gesogte blommeskou-trofee in China The largest impact crater in the history of the Earth has largely flattened with erosion but the huge bowl remains as a reminder of the planet's violent past and possible future Located around the small village of Vredefort which lies near the center of the impact zone the remaining ripples and rings of the huge earthen wound are only fully visible from space The original crater is thought to have been around 190 miles in diameter although the more dramatic slopes have been worn down in the millennia since the meteoric impact The crater is also one of the only ancient impact sites to feature multiple rings which speaks to the sheer violence of the collision which occurred billions of years in the past With local development in the area threatening to erase the geologic rarity the Vredefort Dome within the crater was added to the list of UNESCO World Heritage Sites in 2005 A lake in the middle of the tundra of Quebec is said to be the purest freshwater lake on Earth Sunset-colored dunes of volcanic ash make taking a poor photo impossible Even King Tut was intrigued by the glass of the Great Sand Sea A lake formed in the basin of a massive impact crater takes the shape of an unbroken ring when viewed from above Intensely colorful calcite pools in Southern China Home to the deepest rift anywhere on Earth and once the site of epic destruction that lives on in legends Metrics details in the absence of a significant ambient magnetic field Lower than average magnetic field intensities are also observed above the Vredefort meteorite crater in South Africa yet here we show that the rocks in this crater possess much higher magnetic intensities than equivalent lithologies found elsewhere on Earth We find that palaeomagnetic directions of these strongly magnetized rocks are randomly oriented with vector directions changing over centimetre length scales the magnetite grains contributing to the magnetic remanence crystallized during impact which directly relates the randomization and intensification to the impact event The strong and randomly oriented magnetization vectors effectively cancel out when summed over the whole crater the magnetic field appears much lower than that of neighbouring terranes implying that magnetic anomalies of meteorite craters cannot be used as evidence for the absence of the planet's internally generated magnetic field at the time of impact Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout Global distribution of crustal magnetization discovered by the Mars Global Surveyor MAG/ER experiment Distribution of crustal magnetic fields on Mars: Shock effects of basin-forming impacts Impact demagnetization of the Martian crust Dating the shock wave and thermal imprint of the giant Vredefort impact Shock metamorphism of quartz in nature and experiment: I Shock metamorphism of quartz in nature and experiment: II Characterization of magnetite particles in shocked quartz by means of electron- and magnetic force microscopy: Vredefort Magnetic anomaly near the center of the Vredefort structure: implications for impact-related magnetic signatures ‘Super magnetic’ rocks generated by shock metamorphism from the center of the Vredefort impact structure Paleomagnetic evidence relevant to the origin of the Vredefort ring Paleomagnetic Study and Magnetic Modeling of the Vredefort Dome Paleomagnetism of anorthosite in and around the Charlevoix cryptoexplosion structure Shock-induced remanent magnetization in late Precambrian rocks from Lake Superior Notes on rock magnetic characteristics in applied geophysical studies Tectonic exhumation and tilting of the Mount Givens pluton Magnetic fabric and emplacement of the post-collisional Pomovaara Granite Complex in northern Fennoscandia Laboratory observations of impact-generated magnetic fields Electromagnetic properties of impact-generated plasma Constraints on the size of the Vredefort impact crater from numerical modeling Magnetic properties of single and multi-domain magnetite under pressures from 0 to 6 GPa Effect of pressure on the Néel temperature of magnetite Effect of pressure on the Curie temperature of titanomagnetites [(1 - x)·Fe3O4–x·TiFe2O4] Geological Map of the Country Around Vredefort Download references This work was supported by the French Ministries of Foreign Affairs and Education and Research INSU and the South African National Research Foundation The authors declare that they have no competing financial interests Download citation Anyone you share the following link with will be able to read this content: Sorry, a shareable link is not currently available for this article. 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Image: Thapelo Morebudi It's been a tough four days for residents in Parys and Vredefort who have been without electricity and endured knock-on water outages while the municipality worked to come up with the cash to honour its promise to pay Eskom The municipality is one of Eskom's worst debtors which is why the power utility wanted payment up front.  private homes and residents in old age homes and retirement villages have been without electricity and water but are standing together to help each other.  a manager at Sally Martin Park Methodist home in Parys said the past few days had been difficult but the love and support from the community is keeping us going as soon as we started having water problems we were worried But our community came through and immediately offered to bring us water from their boreholes,” she told TimesLIVE.  The home is running up a big bill for backup power From Friday to Monday afternoon they spent about R15,000 on fuel to keep their generators running.  “We can't keep the elderly in the dark so we had to do what we had to do to make them comfortable,” she said.  Passeno said they had so far been able to run most of their important services “This has been a draining time for all of us You can even see how drained and depressed the staff are here because when they leave here they go home to the same situation in the township worse for them is that they have no backup power,” she said.  Bed and breakfast owner Elize van Hosthuizen told TimesLIVE it was difficult to meet the expectations of guests who had already checked in when the outage occurred “Some things are not able to run on backup power This left so many of our guests unhappy when they couldn't make a cup of coffee from their rooms.” Though she has borehole water and backup power she felt it unfair that they couldn't access services they have already paid for from the municipality.  I really wish we could do what other towns were able to do by getting a third party to manage the finances of the municipality to ensure that service providers like Eskom are paid on time,” she said.  said: “At this point I wish we could get our electricity supply from Eskom because this municipality is failing us “We are paying for our electricity and are shocked to see the municipality owes Eskom so much money,” he said On Monday the power utility announced it is working on restoring power in Ngwathe local municipality and it should be restored by midnight This after it received R1.1m from the municipality “The payment will be allocated to repairs required to restore supply to Parys and Vredefort in the Free State after overloading on the Ngwathe electrical network tripped and damaged Eskom’s equipment on Friday July 1,” Eskom said.  It had been warning the municipality since 2018 that continuously exceeding its notified maximum demand (NMD) — the contracted amount of electricity supplied by Eskom to the municipality — would damage the Eskom network and the municipality had to apply for an upgrade to its NMD Eskom said in August 2021 and in April 2022 it informed the municipality that damage to the network caused by the municipality's negligence would be at the municipality's cost “The municipality agreed to this condition and though they were informed and aware of the risks they did not take the necessary precautions .. Eskom is pleased to confirm that the payment [of R1.1m] was finally received [for] the efforts to upgrade their NMD the supply to Ngwathe should be restored by midnight tonight [Monday] “Today’s repairs will focus on the hot connections and will only be temporary to assist communities Another outage will be scheduled to repair the transformer bushings that were also damaged during the overloading incident Details of this planned outage will be shared with the municipality.” at the end of June 2022 Ngwathe municipality's overdue debt totalled R1.89bn “This debt continues to grow as current accounts are not paid in full Ngwathe’s non-adherence to payment conditions and negligence in protecting the power system jeopardises Eskom’s financial sustainability as well as the security of supply to residents of towns such as Parys and Vredefort.”   Supply to Ngwathe will be restored to the capacity as per the contracted NMD “Risks of overloading and consequent damage remain and the municipality must invest in upgrading its supply,” Eskom said Support independent journalism by subscribing to the Sunday Times. Just R20 for the first month. Sign up (it's quick and free) or sign in now Please read our Comment Policy before commenting Geologists say they've discovered rocks long thought vanished the youngest remains of the oldest and biggest impact crater on Earth In the abraded heart of South Africa's Vredefort impact crater lurk striking green-black rocks some of the only remnants of a magma sea that once filled the gaping crater according to a study to be published this May in the journal Geology geologists thought nearly all of these "impact melt" rocks were lost to time Some 6 miles (10 kilometers) of Vredefort crater has worn away since it was whacked open 2.02 billion years ago "It's like discovering a new rock type in the Grand Canyon," said study co-author Desmond Moser a geochronologist at Western University in Ontario "Vredefort has been walked over for 100 years." "I think this is a definite step forward in trying to understand the top of the Vredefort structure," said Matthew Huber lead author of the second study and a planetary geologist at the University of Brussels in Belgium The ancient Vredefort impact structure was once a much bigger crater The asteroid or meteor that hit proto-Africa was 6 miles (10 km) wide and excavated a hole 10 times deeper than the Grand Canyon The impact's tremendous heat melted the Earth's crust Moser and his co-author Lisa Cupelli have also explored the remains of a similar molten sea at Ontario's Sudbury crater which is just slightly smaller and younger than Vredefort At Vredefort, little of this impact melt lake remains. There are messy impact-related breccias formed as slices of crust slumped into the crater just after impact The slices slid so fast that the resulting friction melted rock into glass called pseudotachylite There are also lava-filled fractures called dikes forged from fingers of the impact melt that penetrated the local rock But Moser made a lucky find in the 1990s in the center of the crater He was trying to pin down Vredefort's age when he accidently discovered pristine 2.02-billion-year-old zircons — tiny minerals with no signs of violent shocks The dikes burrow through ancient crust once buried 12 miles (20 km) deep in the Earth Moser thinks partially cooled magma leaked into crustal rocks that oozed in like toothpaste to plug the crater (The crust rose up like a dome — picture the slow-motion videos of a raindrop hitting a bowl of water.)   So Moser and Cupelli recently returned to South Africa and searched for definitive evidence that the magma dikes were as young as the crater itself "I wanted to put away all the doubts that this was impact-related," Cupelli said but the same temperature as in Sudbury's impact melt levels of the element hafnium suggest that the magma melted from the 3-billion-year-old rocks originally overlying the crater (the same sedimentary and volcanic rocks in nearby Witwatersrand Basin) not from the very deep crust now exposed by 2 billion years of erosion The new study has already kicked off a search for Moser's rocks by other Vredefort researchers, who hope to confirm or deny the results. [Earth Quiz: Do You Really Know Your Planet?] "I think the final solution to this dilemma is still out there," said Uwe Reimold a professor at Humboldt University in Berlin and director of the Museum für Naturkunde Reimold is firmly in the anti-impact-melt camp though he praised the study's zircon chemical techniques "I still think this is consistent with an interpretation as a pseudotachylytic breccia," Reimold said Yet there are very old rocks with similar compositions and textures such as the distinctive layering of Vredefort's impact melt "What Vredefort teaches us is that we haven't been looking with the right set of eyes at some of these ancient rocks," Moser said The right set of eyes was key in finding Vredefort's impact ejecta in Karelia The vaporized rock had originally been identified as ooids which are tiny spheres of calcium carbonate that usually form in shallow tropical seas But Huber noticed a resemblance to round impact glass (called spherules) and asked for permission to examine the rock samples: two drill cores acquired during the Fennoscandian Arctic Russia–Drilling Early Earth Project (FARDEEP) "We quickly found evidence that these were impact spherules," Huber said and some that were completely pulled apart into a teardrop shape which is completely impossible for ooids." The impact glass is completely replaced by minerals such as calcite and pyrite space-linked elements such as platinum and ruthenium remain The glass is scattered in rock whose age ranges from 2.05 billion to 1.98 billion years That span means there's a chance a different impact could have blasted the spherules into the sky but they do match the expected characteristics of a Vredefort-like event "We're hoping to do more geochemistry on these particular rocks to try and nail down even further what the source would have been," Huber said Future plans include trying to figure out what kind of space hunk smashed into Earth and comparing the spherules to Vredefort's unique mineralogy "I hope this inspires people to look more carefully at their rocks," he said "It's really important to look for these fine details to better understand the cratering history of the Earth." Yellowstone holds potentially untapped cache of 'carbon-free' helium for rockets These are the sharpest images yet of planets being born around distant stars ShareSaveCommentInnovationScienceAsteroid That Formed Largest And Oldest Impact Crater On Earth Was Bigger Than Previously BelievedByDavid Bressan Forbes contributors publish independent expert analyses and insights David Bressan is a geologist who covers curiosities about Earth.Follow AuthorSep 27 08:31am EDTShareSaveCommentThis article is more than 2 years old.Satellite Imagery showing rim structure of the partially buried Vredefort impact crater in South .. and forming the Vredefort crater - the biggest and oldest terrestrial impact crater known so far But according to new research from the University of Rochester the impactor may have been much bigger - and would have had devastating consequences across the planet "Understanding the largest impact structure that we have on Earth is critical," says Natalie Allen based on research she conducted as an undergraduate at Rochester University "Having access to the information provided by a structure like the Vredefort crater is a great opportunity to test our model and our understanding of the geologic evidence so we can better understand impacts on Earth and beyond." the Vredefort crater has been partially buried by younger sediments An object that is 15 kilometers in size and traveling at a velocity of 15 kilometers per second would produce a crater about 172 kilometers (approximately 107 miles) in diameter These current estimates are based on new geological evidence and measurements estimating that the structure's original diameter would have been between 250 and 280 kilometers (approximately 155 and 174 miles) during the time of the impact The researchers conducted simulations to match the updated size of the crater Their results showed that an impactor would have to be much larger - about 20 to 25 kilometers - and traveling at a velocity of 15 to 20 kilometers per second to explain the observed crater size the Vredefort impact did not leave a record of mass extinction given that there were only single-cell lifeforms 2 billion years ago," Nakajima says the impact would have affected the global climate potentially more extensively than the Chicxulub impact did." "This could have had a devastating effect on photosynthetic organisms After the dust and aerosols settled - which could have taken anywhere from hours to a decade - greenhouse gases such as carbon-dioxide that were emitted from the impact would have raised the global temperature potentially by several degrees for a long period of time." A study published in 2019 found a widespread and dramatic drop - from 80 to 99.5 percent - in microbial activity around 2 billion years ago Scientists weren't sure what caused this drop the distance of the land mass containing Karelia would have been only 2,000 to 2,500 kilometers from the crater in South Africa - much closer than the two areas are today "It is incredibly difficult to constrain the location of landmasses long ago," Allen says "The current best simulations have mapped back about a billion years Clarifying evidence such as this ejecta layer mapping may allow researchers to test their models and help complete the view into the past." This website is using a security service to protect itself from online attacks The action you just performed triggered the security solution There are several actions that could trigger this block including submitting a certain word or phrase You can email the site owner to let them know you were blocked Please include what you were doing when this page came up and the Cloudflare Ray ID found at the bottom of this page The Vredefort crater in South Africa is the world's biggest of its sort stretching up to 300 kilometers (more than 180 miles) from edge to edge Trekking continuously through one corner to the next could require around roughly three days In recent report from both local and national media offices, notably the Science Alert that the marks left by a meteorite crash two billion years earlier have already been formerly blown to pieces by the environment abandoning opportunity for debate about the exact scope of the event and the energies that generated it Moreover, according to recent study published under the Journal of Geophysical Research: Planets and predicated on what is assumed to be a highly realistic reconstruction of the asteroid strike the projectile that created the crater was bigger than originally anticipated Wherein environmental researcher Miki Nakajima of the University of Rochester in New York State explains that unlike the Chicxulub collision the Vredefort repercussions left no evidence of widespread destruction or bushfires the meteorite that struck two billion years ago was larger than the one that produced the Chicxulub crater and wiped out the dinosaurs 66 million years ago the debris accountable for the devastation was approximately to 20 to 25 kilometers throughout and moving at a speed of 15 to 20 kilometers per second in the minutes preceding collision The Vredefort collision debris has been found as far afield as soviet Russia however the studies suggest this area would be significantly nearer to the accretion disk two billion decades earlier two billion years is a long time for a topography to erode so determining the start point of the impact with precision is difficult Getting availability of data supplied by a complex such as the Vredefort crater is a fantastic chance to put the concept as well as comprehension of sedimentary data to the stress allowing us to properly comprehend collisions on Planet and elsewhere This information contributes to a deeper knowledge of how the globe has developed over millions and millions of years despite massive geomorphologic as well as biological upheaval and many asteroid crashes Conversely, as shown in the study posted under Science Direct the event might have had a greater influence on worldwide weather patterns than the Chicxulub influence Previous estimations estimated the asteroid's diameter at 15 kilometers (9.3 miles) and speed at 15 kilometers per second The modeling research performed here as well allows academics to gain a deeper understanding of how continental plates may have changed through time In his official statement Johns Hopkins University astronomer Natalie Allen remarked that acknowledging the greatest influence mechanism that humanity has on Earth is crucial it is quite challenging to restrict the position of mountain ranges that were distant past © 2025 NatureWorldNews.com All rights reserved