Saint Martin - Hypervelocity Impact Crater

Alternate Names Lake Saint Martin
Local Language
Coordinates 51° 46' 9" N; 98° 30' 27" W
Notes
  1. Town of Gypsumville is within its boundaries.
Country Canada
Region Manitoba
Date Confirmed 1970
Notes
  1. PDFs in quartz and diaplectic feldspar glass (McCabe and Bannatyne, 1970).
Buried? Yes
Notes
  1. Almost completely buried by Jurassic sandstones and shales; some of this cover has been subsequently eroded (McCabe and Bannatyne, 1970).
Drilled? Yes
Notes
  1. 5 holes, totaling 330 m were drilled into the crater, (McCabe, 1977; 1983).
Target Type Mixed
Notes
  1. Archean and Upper Devonian, Ordovician (Ogilvie et al., 1984).
Sub-Type Carbonate, Dolomite, Gneiss
Apparent Crater Diameter (km) 40 km
Age (Ma) 227.8 ± 0.9
Notes :
  1. 227.4 ± 0.8 Ma determined by 40Ar/39Ar of melt rock (Schmieder et al., 2013). Additional age constraints: Rb-Sr mineral isochron gives an age of 220 ± 32 (Reimold et al., 1990).

Method :
  1. 40Ar/39Ar
Impactor Type Unknown

Advanced Data Fields

Notes

Erosion
4
  1. Ejecta and rim eroded and the crater-fill products have been partially preserved (McCabe and Bannatyne, 1970).
Final Rim Diameter
Unknown
Apparent Rim Diameter
40 km
  1. Diameter is ~40 km (Schmieder et al., 2014). A crater with circular configuration ~22.5 km in diameter and the total structurally disturbed area is 41.8-45 km (26-28 miles) in diameter (McCabe and Bannatyne, 1970).
Rim Reliability Index
2
  1. Surface outcrops are rare, but the extensive drilling program resulted in the recognition of a central uplift, melt rocks and a crater-fill of polymict fragmental and melt breccias (Reimold et al., 1987).
Crater Morphology
Complex
Central Uplift Diameter
4km
Central Uplift Height
Unknown
Uplift Reliability Index
4
Structural Uplift
Unknown
Thickness of Seds
Target Age
Precambrian Palaeozoic
Marine
No
Impactor Type
Other Shock Metamorphism
Maskelynite
  1. (McCabe and Bannatyne, 1970)
Shatter Cones
Yes
  1. Buried impact structure. Professor Michael Issigonis disputes this claim and says there is evidence for shatter cones, "expulsion cones", and there is an "umbrella structure". (Spray et al., 1998)
Planar Fractures
No
Planar Deformation Features
Yes
  1. PDF in quartz and feldspar grains (Dence, 1970) (McCabe and Bannatyne, 1970). PDF in quartz, feldspar, and maskelynite (Grieve, 2006).
Diaplectic Glass
No
Coesite
No
Stisovite
No
Crater Fill
LB, MB, M
  1. The melt rocks form a sheet of tens of meters thick, are aphanitic and the clast content increases towards the top of the sheet, which is overlain by 12 m of "breccia with amoeboid pods of solidified melt " (MB) (Simonds and McGee, 1979). Pseudotachylite with shocked clasts occur in the central uplift.
Proximal Ejecta
Distal Ejecta
Dykes
P
Volume of Melt
Depth of Melting

References

Spot a missing reference? Submit Reference

H E Hunter (1951) Igneous rocks in the Lake Saint Martin area, Manitoba, Department of Mines and Natural Resources, Mines Branch, Province of Manitoba, p. 1-8, url

G S Barry (1961) Geological investigation of the Gods Lake Narrows area, Gods Lake mining division (53L/9 west half), p. 60-61, pdf

K L Currie (1969) Lake St. Martin structure, Manitoba, Report of Activities Part A: April to October, p. 70-71

K L Currie (1970) New Canadian cryptoexplosion crater at Lake St Martin, Manitoba, Nature 226(5248), p. 839-841, Macmillan Journals, London, url

Michael R Dence (1970) Shock metamorphism at the Lake Saint Martin (Manitoba) structure, Geological Association of Canada-Mineralogical Association of Canada, Joint Annual Meetings, Abstracts of Papers, Univ. Manitoba, Winnipeg, url

H R McCabe, B Bannatyne (1970) Lake Saint Martin crypto-explosion crater and geology of the surrounding area, Geological Survey of Manitoba 3/70, p. 79, Manitoba Department of Energy and Mines, Mineral Resources Division, Winnipeg, MB, url

H R McCabe (1977) GS-18 stratigraphic core hole program, Manitoba Department of Mines, Resources and Environment Management, Mineral Resources Division, p. 93-96

C H Simonds, J L Warner, P E McGee, A Cochran (1978) On central uplifts in three terrestrial impact structures, Lunar and Planetary Science Conference 9, p. 1065-1067, url

J F Clark (1979) Geomagnetic surveys at four Canadian craters, Canada Department of Energy, Mines and Resources, Earth Physics Branch, Geomagnetic Report, p. 1-41

C H Simonds, P E McGee (1979) Petrology of impactites from Lake St. Martin structure, Manitoba, Proceedings of the Lunar and Planetary Science Conference(10, Vol. 3), R B Merrill, D D Bogard, F Hoerz, D S McKay, P C Robertson (ed.), p. 2493-2518, Pergamon, New York, NY, url

R L Coles, J F Clark (1982) Lake St. Martin impact structure, Manitoba, Canada: Magnetic anomalies and magnetizations, Journal of Geophysical Research 87(B8), p. 7087-7095, American Geophysical Union, Washington, DC, url, doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.1029/JB087iB08p07087

Carlton C Allen, J L Gooding, K Keil (1982) Hydrothermally altered impact melt rock and breccia: Contributions to the soil of Mars, Journal of Geophysical Research 87(B12), p. 10083-10101, url, doi:10.1029/JB087iB12p10083

J F Clark (1983) Magnetic survey data at meteoritic impact sites in North America, Geomagnetic Service of Canada, Earth Physics Branch Open File # 83-5, p. 30, Geomagnetic Service of Canada

H R McCabe (1983) GS-22: Stratigraphic mapping and Stratigraphic and Industrial Minerals Core Hole Program, Report of Field Activities - Mineral Resources Division (Winnipeg) 1983, p. 122-130, Manitoba Department of Energy and Mines, Mineral Resources Division, Winnipeg, MB, url

B Bannatyne, H McCabe (1984) Manitoba crater revealed, Geos 13(3), p. 10-13, Canada Department of Energy, Mines and Resources, Ottawa, ON, pdf

R A F Grieve, P B Robertson, B Y Ogilivie (1984) Meteorite Impact Features in Canada-an Inventory and an Evaluation

W U Reimold, M Tredoux, R A F Grieve, M Prinz (1986) A geochemical study of the Lake St. Martin melt and basement rocks, LPI Contribution 600, p. R-19, Lunar and Planetary Institute, Houston, TX, url

Y P Gurov, Y P Gurova (1987) Impact structures on the Earth's surface, Geologicheskiy Zhurnal 47(1), p. 117-124, Naukova Dumka, Kiev, url

W U Reimold, J M Barr, R A F Grieve, M Tredoux (1987) INAA and Rb-Sr isotope analysis of Lake St. Martin melt and country rocks, Abstracts of Papers Submitted to the Lunar and Planetary Science Conference 18, Part 3, p. 828-829, Lunar and Planetary Science Conference, Houston, TX, url

W U Reimold, J M Barr, R A F Grieve, R J Durrheim (1990) Geochemistry of the melt and country rocks of the Lake St. Martin impact structure, Manitoba, Canada, Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta 54(7), p. 2093-2111, Pergamon, Oxford, url, doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/0016-7037(90)90273-N

K G Osadetz, R K Bezys, B P Kohn (1993) Enigmatic terrestrial structures in Manitoba; astroblemes or cryptoexplosive features?, Manitoba Mining and Mineral Convention '92, I T Hosain (ed.), url

C Davids, W D Gosnold (1995) Gravity survey of the Lake Saint Martin impact structure, southern Manitoba, Abstracts with Programs - Geological Society of America 27(6), p. 208, Geological Society of America (GSA), Boulder, CO, url

B P Kohn, K G Osadeta, R K Bezys (1995) Apatite fission-tracking dating of two crater structures in the Canadian Williston Basin, Bulletin of Canadian Petroleum Geology 43(1), p. 54-64, Canadian Society of Petroleum Geologists, Calgary, AB, pdf

R A F Grieve, M Pilkington (1996) The signature of terrestrial impacts, AGSO Journal of Australian Geology and Geophysics 16(4), Andrew Y Glikson (ed.), p. 399-420, Australian Geological Survey Organisation, Canberra, A.C.T., url

J G Spray, S P Kelley, D B Rowley (1998) Evidence for a late Triassic multiple impact event on Earth, Nature 392(6672), p. 171-173, pdf, doi:10.1038/32397

D V Kent, J G Spray (1998) Impacts on Earth in the Late Triassic; discussion and reply, Nature 395(6698), p. 126, Macmillan Journals, London, url

S L Simpson, A J Desbarats (2003) Isotopic characterization of groundwaters in the vicinity of the Lake Saint-Martin impact structure, 56th Annual Canadian Geotechnical Conference and 4th Joint IAH-CNC/CGS Groundwater Specialty Conference 6

A J Desbarats (2003) Hydrogeology of the Lake Saint-Martin impact structure, Manitoba, Canada, Proc. 4th Joint IAH-CNC/CGS Conference, Winnipeg, Manitoba, url

R A F Grieve (2008) Impact structures in Canada, Geoscience Canada 35(1), p. 47-48, St. John's, NL: Geological Association of Canada

A J Desbarats (2009) On elevated fluoride and boron concentrations in ground waters associated with the Lake Saint-Martin impact structure, Manitoba, Applied Geochemistry 24(5), p. 915-927, Elsevier, Oxford-New York-Beijing, url, doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.apgeochem.2009.02.016

Alexandre J. Desbarats (2009) On elevated fluoride and boron concentrations in groundwaters associated with the Lake Saint-Martin impact structure, Manitoba, Applied Geochemistry 24(5), p. 915-927, url, doi:10.1016/j.apgeochem.2009.02.016

Enrico Flamini, A Coletta, M L Battagliere, M Virelli (2019) Saint Martin, Canada, Encyclopedic Atlas of Terrestrial Impact Craters, p. 599-600, Springer, Cham, url, doi:https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-05451-9_166