In what is now the Atacama Desert in northern Chile, an apocalyptic event likely occurred at least 11,000 years ago. A comet would have exploded as it approached the Earth’s surface, generating a jet of fire with winds similar to those of a hurricane or tornado.
At that time, the landscape in that region of the planet was very different from the current absolute aridity: there was abundant vegetation, giant animals and bodies of water, possibly lakes.
The hell generated by the explosion of the comet in the sky would not only have the ability to destroy living beings on Earth, but would also create a mystery for geologists to this day.
This is because in a point of the Atacama Desert, called the Tamarugal pampa, rocks with crystalline formations of uncertain origin were discovered in 2008 until recently.
Last week, a group of scientists published the results of a new study in which they concluded that the glass fields were created by the effect of a comet explosion.
“This explosion descended towards the surface of the ground like a very hot plasma, at around 1,700° C,” geologist Nicolás Blanco explains to BBC News Mundo. “This plasma was accompanied by hurricane-force winds, similar to tornadoes. The heat combined with the winds generated the molten bodies with some of the comet’s material, melting and incorporating these rocks that were also molten.”
In 2008, the geologist discovered the glass fields together with his colleague Andrew Tomlinson (both from the National Service of Geology and Mining of Chile, Sernageomin). This led to research by Blanco, Tomlison, Peter Schultz, Scott Harris, and Sebastián Perroud published November 2 in the journal Geology.
a desert mystery
The glass fields are spread over a strip about 70 km long in the Tamarugal pampas.
The rock formations that present crystalline incrustations, after being analyzed, were cataloged as originating from the Late Pleistocene. That is, they would be at least 10,500 years old.
“The rock is of the slag type, as they are known in the steel industry, with dark green colored glasses that have no economic value in themselves, because they do not have a particular beauty”, explains Blanco.
“Within this molten material, there are small microscopic crystals that give it the special character it has.”
The changes on our planet that created the desert would have generated the hyperaridity by which many of these rocks were preserved almost as soon as they were formed.
“This is not very common. There is some evidence in some parts of Africa and Australia, with arid climates, and it is easier to see it there. But in areas with vegetation it is very difficult (to see) so it is a very interesting discovery for science “, tells Alejandro Cecioni, national deputy director of geology at Sernageomin, to BBC News Mundo.
When Blanco and Tomlinson found the rocks, they wondered how they had formed. “The example of the impact of meteorites on the Earth’s surface is already known: they form craters and leave traces of molten rock that indicate the effects of the high temperature and pressure of the impact.”
“But in this region these impact craters don’t exist. So how do you explain a heat source other than a meteorite impact?”
Why a comet?
These types of crystalline formations can be found in other parts of the planet, where volcanic activity, a meteorite collision or a lightning strike have left a mark on the ground.
But at that point in the Atacama Desert there is no evidence of volcanoes or traces of the impact of a space body of such magnitude. What researchers have found are three minerals they consider essential.
The analyzes showed that the fusion of cubanite, trolite and baddeleyite occurs in glasses, with the first two minerals being those detected in meteorites and comets.
In the 2000s, NASA’s Stardust mission brought samples of comet Wild-2 to Earth with the presence of cubanite and trolite.
Since there was no evidence of a meteorite crash, scientists believe that the fusion of minerals and crystalline formation were caused by the impact of a comet.
“These three elements were indicative that the formation process was at a very high temperature and was generated by this thermal process that came from space”, says Blanco.
The Big Fire Theory
An event with similar characteristics to the impact that scientists talk about has not been documented by humanity.
The “Tunguska event”, a massive detonation in Russia in the early 20th century, is attributed to the aerial explosion of a meteorite as it left no crater on the Earth’s surface. But it did not cause as much devastation as is known to have occurred in Atacama, Chile.
“The two events coincide with the destruction of the local megafauna. At that time, (which is now Atacama) there were large animals that stayed in an environment with vegetation, which also burned at very high temperatures, which is not very common” , says Cecioni, who is part of the National Service of Geology and Mining of Chile.
An earlier theory hypothesized that the glass formations were caused by vegetation fires, but Blanco says there is no evidence that a surface fire could generate more heat than 1,700°C to the point of melting the minerals. found.
In general, forest fires can generate temperatures of up to 500°C. “No forest fire anywhere has left evidence of molten glass of this magnitude. In large forest fires in various parts of the world, the existence of soil melting has never been reported”, says the geologist.
For this and other reasons, he and his colleagues consider evidence of the formation of the mysterious rocks with crystals to be the product of an energy-releasing event such as a comet explosion.
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