Model Shows Fallout of Giant Meteorite Strike

Seeking to better understand the level of death and destruction that would result from a large meteorite striking the Earth, Princeton University researchers have developed a new model that can not only more accurately simulate the seismic fallout of such an impact, but also help reveal new information about the surface and interior of planets based on past collisions.

Princeton researchers created the first model to take into account Earth’s elliptical shape, surface features and ocean depths in simulations of how seismic waves generated by a meteorite collision would spread across and within the planet. Current projections rely on models of a featureless spherical world with nothing to disrupt the meteorite’s impact, the researchers report in the October issue of Geophysical Journal International.

The researchers — based in the laboratory of Jeroen Tromp, the Blair Professor of Geology in Princeton’s Department of Geosciences — simulated the meteorite strike that caused the Chicxulub crater in Mexico, an impact 2 million times more powerful than a hydrogen bomb that many scientists believe triggered the mass extinction of the dinosaurs 65 million years ago. The team’s rendering of the planet showed that the impact’s seismic waves would be scattered and unfocused, resulting in less severe ground displacement, tsunamis, and seismic and volcanic activity than previously theorized.

Full Story: http://www.princeton.edu/main/news/archive/S31/90/32S94/