DR Congo Ring May Be Giant Impact Crater 96
Phrogman writes "The BBC is reporting that deforestation has 'revealed what could be a giant impact crater in Central Africa, scientists say. The 36-46km-wide feature, identified in DR Congo, may be one of the largest such structures discovered in the last decade.' If you search Google Maps for 'Omeonga Democratic Republic of the Congo,' you will be right in the middle of the suspected crater."
Indiana Jones (Score:1, Insightful)
Google earth (Score:2)
here's [k12.ny.us] an interesting KMZ of impact craters
So you're saying that superman... (Score:2)
actually landed in the DR Congo some years back?
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What's the opposite of Christopher Reeves? (Score:5, Interesting)
Christopher Walken.
But seriously, my GF in college worked with Chris Reeves at the Williamstown Theater Festival, and she said he was the nicest, most supportive and hard working actor she's ever met. He would thank the freaking techs! He would run lines with interns fer chrissake!
He got thrown from his horse the summer after that, we were both pretty sad for the man.
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Re:What's the opposite of Christopher Reeves? (Score:4, Funny)
Oh God, you're right. I can't believe I put wooden face's last name on Christopher.
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What about George?
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I meant: are you related to him?
And I think that Kirk Alynreeves, Bud Collyereeve, Dean Cainreeves, Tom Wellingreeve, and Brandon Reevesouth (among others) would take issue with your "both actors" comment. :)
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Re:So you're saying that superman... (Score:4, Funny)
Well, the leading theories right now are that it was either Superman crashing to earth at hypersonic speeds, or your mom playing hopscotch.
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Sigh. We've talked to Mom about that, but, well, you know....
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Yo momma so fat everyone accepts it as common knowledge and thus has no need to draw attention to it, so they make fun of you instead.
Deforestation (Score:5, Funny)
Deforestation has revealed what could be a giant impact crater in Central Africa, scientists say.
Well then, we should keep deforesting the entire planet. Who knows what amazing discoveries await?!
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Scientist: Everyone, listen! I've made an amazing discovery: We're all doomed!
Everyone: Yay!
Re:Deforestation (Score:4, Insightful)
Well then, we should keep deforesting the entire planet. Who knows what amazing discoveries await?!
We should not. The amazing discovery could easily be the one that increasing deforestation means more craters. (It seems kind of obvious when you take a look at the Moon.)
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So... if I deforest my annoying neighbor's property, he'll get hit by a meteor?
COOL!
not really (Score:1)
Not so cool for you unless your neighbour is tens of kilometres away
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Well then, we should keep deforesting the entire planet.
Don't worry. We are.
More Of The Same? (Score:2)
Re:More Of The Same? (Score:4, Interesting)
So the current destruction of that part of the earth has revealed an earlier attempt to destroy that part of the earth ... when will Mother Nature learn she can't get rid of us that easy?
She doesn't want to kill us off. We're her eggs. She wants us to leave the nest, and go reproduce her on other planets.
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Actually, it's not Mother Nature that is wanting us to leave, it's Father Nature. He's been trying for several millenia to get some "alone time" with Ma Nature.
That's right, humans and animals are all essentially cock-blocking Father Nature from getting some. He's finally pissed off enough to do something about it (earthquakes, global warming, tsunamis, etc), especially since he started taking Viagra.
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She doesn't want to kill us off. We're her eggs. She wants us to leave the nest, and go reproduce her on other planets.
I always thought that Mother Nature didn't like to be anthropomorphized. She's tetchy like that.
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She told me she liked it! Fickle woman.
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Good old Manifest Destiny!
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More of an offshoot of the Gaia Hypothesis. [wikipedia.org]
But the criticism is still valid. I would have to add 'reproduce her on other planets that do not already harbor life' although, as long as we are anthropomorphizing Mother Nature, I don't think the bitch would care if we offed other biospheres in order to reproduce her.
But we're also her conscience as well as her eggs, so I think we should care. It's also logical, and in our self interest. Who knows when we might meet a superior race? If we have proven that we can
Similar feature (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Similar feature (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Similar feature (Score:4, Informative)
It is kind of hard to make a straight-line irrigation beam extend and contract to form a hexagon as it goes around. These plots are irrigated from underground aquifers. There's a well in the middle and then a long irrigation beam that goes in a circle around the well. The pressure is controlled so the sprinkler heads near the middle release less water (since they cover less ground).
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What he means is that if each section was hexagon in shape, you could still use the same type of watering system, but dramatically reduce the area in the corners that the watering system misses.
In an attempt to answer his question, there are a few possible reasons (of many more, I'm sure) that I can come up with. It might be inconvenient to lay out hexagonal access roads that form the borders of these sections. This also most likely stems from initial property plots being given out in square segments and
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No, you've fundametally misunderstood the problem. If you were to fit the circles inside of hexagons instead of inside of squares you'd find that 10% more area fits inside the circles.
The GP was not saying use hexagons instead of circles, he was saying hexagons instead of the squares AROUND the circles.
You'd have to redraw property lines, move roads (Score:1)
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Not necessarily. Sometimes the pivot is fed by a pipeline from a more remote water source.
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Couldn't they line up another well in the center of where the 4 corners meet to correct for the missed space?
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I believe it is due to how they water the plants. It pivots at a central point and therefore is round.
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Yes, and that has nothing to do with the GP's comment. Comment was about hexagons vs. squares that the circles are placed inside of.
Re:Similar feature (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Similar feature (Score:4, Informative)
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There are circle irrigation fields in Saudi Arabia, of all places. I found them by wandering around in Google Maps -- "what's this dark spot in the middle of the desert??" zoomed in, and lo and behold, it was a big patch of circle irrigators!
I've been told by someone who lived there that the isolated location helps avoid crop destruction by feral goats and other critters, not to mention that there's no need for pest control of any sort.
Streetview, uhh... (Score:1)
http://maps.google.com/?ie=UTF8&t=h&layer=c&cbll=37.577077,-101.661371&panoid=7wISFAVsiS8aFtIM6Xi6fA&cbp=12,6.42,,0,10.21&ll=37.572338,-101.766357&spn=0,359.360046&z=11 [google.com]
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Okay, who bubble-wrapped the planet??
Better look at it real soon . . . (Score:3, Funny)
. . . given Africa's leaders' penchant for pilfering natural resources (oil, diamonds, et al) for their own personal profit, I wouldn't be surprised if the crater got stolen.
Although, that would be an interesting challenge for Swiss bankers: you can deposit diamonds at a bank, but how do you fit a crater in a vault?
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I think thats what happened at vault 87.
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you can deposit diamonds at a bank, but how do you fit a crater in a vault?
Use really, really good compression.
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They will hire Carmen Sandiego to steal it! :D
Reinforcing the already known status (Score:2)
Link? (Score:5, Informative)
What is to stop slashdot from linking to the image in Google Maps [google.com] in the original article?
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Didn't I see this (Score:2)
Didn't I see this on History or the Discovery channel some years ago? Why is it being re-reported now? This ring / impact crater is not *new* news.
Whew... (Score:2, Insightful)
Good thing for deforestation, that big circular river would never have given it away.
I'm still here (Score:5, Funny)
If you search Google Maps for 'Omeonga Democratic Republic of the Congo,' you will be right in the middle of the suspected crater.
I did a google search, but I'm still here in this chair in my cubicle.
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Telefragging? Suddenly have the urge to fire up Doom...
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Looks like there is a ridge running around the site at the exact same place as the circular feature to me...
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I stand corrected... I think I was looking at it backwards. I looks more like it's a depression around that ring...
So it's a reverse crater?
yes, now it is (Score:2)
When a crater forms, there is often a spash up in the middle. Sometimes the whole thing fills with LIQUID MAGMA, just like when you drill to the center of the Earth.
Anyway, stuff that fills the crater can be harder than the rim. Years later, the rim erodes away.
It's like a fossel impression.
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...just like when you drill to the center of the Earth....
You do that often?
Alternative explanations (Score:2)
I would expect a meteor impact to look more like this http://goo.gl/1gcU [goo.gl] but maybe just because it's the only one I've seen in person. According to Google Earth the whole area is pretty flat with exception of the circle of depressed area where there is now a river.
Maybe it's some kind of ancient moat around a giant collapsed culture. The Chinese built a wall - what's to say an ancient culture didn't do the opposite and dig a trench.
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They call it DR Congo (Score:1, Funny)
It's not a real DR, but it is a real Congo. It's an actual, factual Congo.
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It's not a real DR
Damn, I was thinking this Dr Congo could cure my severe case of boogie fever.
Not so fast.... (Score:2, Insightful)
If you look at the region with more than a passing "gee, neat" glance, you will notice that a stream winds its way around what should be the highest apparent point, the rim. Since when do rivers or creeks follow the rims of craters?
It would be far better to use Google Earth to view it, which should provide elevation data for points under the mouse, unlike Google Maps. I'd also like to see it in NASA's World Wind, which allows viewing the same region with imagery from multiple different (satellite) sources
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If you read the original science paper ( http://www.lpi.usra.edu/meetings/lpsc2010/pdf/1601.pdf [usra.edu] ) they looked at topology and geology. The ring is not just a surface feature, it's in the deeper geography.
It had been identified in 2006 by visual circularity only by another researcher ( http://impacts.rajmon.cz/data/Impact_database_2009_2.xls [rajmon.cz] or http://impacts.rajmon.cz/data/Impact_database_2009_2.kmz [rajmon.cz] ). The Italian researchers did some of the geology to support that.
More geology is needed, you want to find
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Goddamn! It's a good thing you were here to notice that and saved a whole lot of people some pointless field work at the site.
Also good evidence that you didn't RTFA, which directly addressed this point.
A+ for Effort though.
Another meteor crater (Score:1)
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It creates a ring formation in the area, and it was also only recently discovered. Half of the crater is in the water, the other half of the crater is on land. Also, very close to this area, people theorize that the "gulf of mexico" was an impact crater that might've caused the dinosaurs to die. The yucatan peninsula sure has an odd shape, and in the water, it almost forms a circle around the gulf of mexico.
Are you talking about Chicxulub, mentioned in the sidebar in TFA and half in the Gulf? That's the on
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Takes so long to identify craters? (Score:2)
I always thought this feature looked pretty crater-like, especially along the eastern edges:
http://maps.google.com/?ie=UTF8&hq=&hnear=North+Bethesda,+Montgomery,+Maryland&ll=65.980034,-178.857422&spn=0.870944,2.469177&t=h&z=9 [google.com]
The clouds kinda obscure this one. But if you look it up in other datasets, such as MS Bing Maps, it's a bit more pronounced. And much larger than any of the other verified craters listed.
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Doesn't look particularly craterish to me, on eastern or western margins. There is a known crater in the area (http://maps.google.com/?ll=67.5,172.08&z=9), and the area is hardly unexplored, so I doubt that you've picked up anything remarkably new.
I don't see anything terribly interesting on OneGeology either, structural un
Don't Do It! (Score:3, Funny)
I did it and then I was right in the middle of that crater.
I'll tell you more when I get back, the Internet link in the middle of this crater is really slow.
Pfft (Score:3, Interesting)
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That's not a gigantic ancient impact crater. That's [google.com] a gigantic ancient impact crater.
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That's not a gigantic ancient impact crater. That's [google.com] a gigantic ancient impact crater.