Environmental Perturbations Caused by the Impacts of Asteroids and Comets

Details Environmental Perturbations Caused by the Impacts of Asteroids and Comets Environmental Perturbations Caused by the Impacts of Asteroids and Comets

May 1997

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=1997nyasa.822..401t&link_type=abstract

Near-Earth Objects, the United Nations International Conference: Proceedings of the international conference held April 24-26, 1

Mathematics

Logic

3

Asteroids, Comets, Environment Effects, Structural Basins, Water Vapor, Boundaries, Earthquakes, Perturbation, Tsunami Waves, Geology

Scientific paper

We review the major mechanisms proposed to cause extinctions at the Cretaceous-Tertiary geological boundary following an asteroid impact. We then discuss how the proposed extinction may relate to the impact of asteroids or comets in general. We discuss the limitations of these mechanisms in terms of the spatial scale that may be affected, and the time scale over which the effects may last. Our goal is to provide relatively simple prescriptions for evaluating the importance of colliding objects having a range of energies and compositions. We also identify the many uncertainties concerning the environmental effects of impacts. We conclude that, for impact energies below about 104 Mts (megatons of TNT equivalent) - i.e., impact frequencies less than in 6 x 104 yr, corresponding to comets and asteroids with diameters smaller than about 400 m and 650 m, respectively - blast damage, earthquakes, and fires should be important on a scale of 104 or 105 km 2, which corresponds to the area damaged in many natural disasters of recent history. However, tsunami could be more damaging, flooding a kilometer of coastal plane over entire ocean basins. In the energy range of 104 to 10 5 Mts (intervals up to 3 x 105 yr; comets and asteroids with sizes up to 800 m and 1.5 km, respectively) water vapor injections and ozone loss become significant on the global scale. In the submicrometer dust injection fraction from the pulverized target material is much higher than is presently thought to be most likely, then dust injection could be important in this energy range.

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