Images related to Richat Structure

Richat Structure, Mauritania
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Richat Structure, Mauritania

Published Jun 26, 2002

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Shoemaker Impact Structure, Western Australia
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Shoemaker Impact Structure, Western Australia

The Shoemaker impact site in Australia may have been formed as long as 1.63 billion years ago.

Published Jul 18, 2011

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Upheaval Dome, Utah
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Upheaval Dome, Utah

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.

Published Jul 23, 2007

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Piccaninny Impact Structure, Western Australia
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Piccaninny Impact Structure, Western Australia

Astronauts capture the first confirmed image of the structure taken from the International Space Station.

Published Mar 4, 2013

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Shoemaker Impact Structure
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Shoemaker Impact Structure

Published Jul 11, 2004

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Calcite Quarry, Michigan
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Calcite Quarry, Michigan

While the Great Lakes region of North America is well known for its importance to shipping between the United States, Canada, and the Atlantic Ocean, it is also the location of an impressive structure in the continent’s bedrock: the Michigan Basin. Formed during the Paleozoic Era (approximately 540–250 million years ago) the Basin looks much like a large bullseye defined by the arrangement of exposed rock layers that all tilt inwards, forming a huge bowl-shaped structure. The outer layers of the Basin include thick deposits of carbonates—rocks containing carbon and oxygen, such as limestone—deposited over millions of years when a shallow sea covered the region. These carbonate rocks are mined throughout the Great Lakes region using large open-pit mines. The largest carbonate mine in the world, Calcite Quarry, appears in this astronaut photograph.

Published Aug 7, 2006

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Bigach Impact Crater, Kazakhstan
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Bigach Impact Crater, Kazakhstan

Bigach Impact Crater in northeastern Kazakhstan is about five million years old—long enough to be reshaped by geologic process, erosion, and human activity.

Published Oct 3, 2011

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Vredefort Crater
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Vredefort Crater

The world’s oldest and largest known impact structure shows some of the most extreme deformation conditions known on Earth.

Published Sep 1, 2018

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Manicouagan Impact Structure, Quebec
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Manicouagan Impact Structure, Quebec

The impact that formed the lake is thought to have occurred about 200 million years ago and may have caused a mass extinction event.

Published Dec 6, 2001

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