Wells Creek - Hypervelocity Impact Crater

Alternate Names
Local Language
Coordinates 36° 22' 43" N; 87° 39' 26" W
Notes
  1. In the counties of Houston and Steward, in the NW part of Tennessee, approximately 100 km NW of Nashville.
Country United States of America
Region Tennessee
Date Confirmed 1959
Notes
  1. Shatter cones described (Dietz, 1959).
Buried? No
Notes
  1. Covered by approximately 15 m of Cretaceous gravel and a thin layer (<1 m) of Quaternary alluvium (Wilson and Stearns, 1968).
Drilled? Yes
Notes
  1. Over 50 drill holes in the area, including a 700 m drill hole (NRCAN binder)
Target Type Sedimentary
Notes
  1. Early Ordovician Know dolomite and Middle Ordovician to Mississippian shales and limestones (Stearns et al., 1968).
Sub-Type Carbonate, Dolomite, Limestone, Shale
Apparent Crater Diameter (km) 13.7 km
Age (Ma) 100 - 323
Notes :
  1. A cover of Cretaceous gravel is not involved in the structural deformation. The structure is, therefore, between Late Mississippian (323.2-330.9 Ma) and Late Cretaceous (66.0-100.5 Ma) in age (Wilson and Stearns, 1968).

Method :
  1. Stratigraphy
Impactor Type Unknown

Advanced Data Fields

Notes

Erosion
6
  1. Approximately 300 m of erosion has taken place, removing most post-Cretaceous strata; the true bottom of the crater is exposed (Stearns et al., 1968).
Final Rim Diameter
Unknown
Apparent Rim Diameter
13.7 km
  1. The structure is ~13.7 km in overall diameter (Ford et al., 2012).
Rim Reliability Index
2
  1. Consists of a central uplifted block surrounded by an annular graben downthrown ~90 m and 1.8 km wide, an annular horst ring 1.2 km wide an outer annular graben down faulted ~30 m and 10.07 km wide (Stearns et al., 1968).
Crater Morphology
Complex
Central Uplift Diameter
4.831km
Central Uplift Height
30 m
Uplift Reliability Index
2
Structural Uplift
780 m
Thickness of Seds
Target Age
Palaeozoic
Marine
No
Impactor Type
Other Shock Metamorphism
No
Shatter Cones
Yes
  1. Shatter cones in dolomite range in length from about 1/2 inch to about 7 inches and in basal diameter from about 1/2 inch to 10 inches (Wilson and Stearns, 1968). "Parasitic cones show up as individual points or as conic sections on the sides of larger cones" (Wilson and Stearns, 1968). "Many single cones have an apical filling of calcite" (Wilson and Stearns, 1968). Apical angles of cones range from 35 to 85° (Wilson and Stearns, 1968). "The apical angles of many cones increase away from the apex" (Wilson and Stearns, 1968). Shatter cones occur only in the lowest beds exposed of coarsely crystalline dolomite (Bucher, 1936). Shatter cones "run obliquely across the bedding planes and traverse several layers" (Bucher, 1936) (Bucher, 1963). Shatter cones abound at the centre of the structure (Bucher, 1965). Remarkable development of shatter cones in Knox dolomite at the centre of the structure, particularly in and near the abandoned quarry on Central Hill (Stearns et al., 1968) (Wilson and Stearns, 1968). More than 1,000 shatter cone orientations were measured, indicating that the apices of the restored cones generally point upward and toward the centre of the structure (Stearns et al., 1968). Shatter cones were reported in a core (drilled near the centre of the basin), well-developed up to ~60 m and then poorly defined, with the exception of one shatter cone recovered at 377 m (Wilson, 1953). A map with the different shatter cone localities of occurence is reported in (Wilson and Stearns, 1968).
Planar Fractures
No
Planar Deformation Features
No
Diaplectic Glass
No
Coesite
No
Stisovite
No
Crater Fill
LB
  1. Injected breccia near center of crater. "consists of a matrix of pulverized rock containing fragments of chert, limestone, and dolomite" (Wilson, 1963).
Proximal Ejecta
Distal Ejecta
Dykes
Volume of Melt
Depth of Melting

References

Spot a missing reference? Submit Reference

W H Bucher (1932) Wells Creek Basin, Tennessee, a typical cryptovolcanic structure, Geological Society of America Bulletin 43(1), p. 147-148, Geological Society of America (GSA), Boulder, CO

W Halbfass (1933) Ein Meteoritenkrater in Suedarabien, Petermanns Geographische Mitteilungen 3-4, p. 72, VEB Hermann Haack Geographisch-Kartographische Anstalt Gotha/Leipzig, Gotha-Leipzig

C W Jr Wilson (1940) Magnetic survey of Wells Creek Basin, Tennessee, Geological Society of America Bulletin 51(12, Part 2), p. 1953-1954, Geological Society of America (GSA), Boulder, CO

Ch W Jr Wilson (1953) Wilcox deposits in explosion craters, Stewart County, Tennessee, and their relations to origin and age of Wells Creek Basin structure, Geological Society of America Bulletin 64(7), p. 753-768, Geological Society of America (GSA), Boulder, CO, url, doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.1130/0016-7606(1953)64[753:WDIECS]2.0.CO;2

O Jr Smith (1959) Isopach map of the Wells Creek dolomite in middle Tennessee, Isopach map of the Wells Creek dolomite in middle Tennessee

J M Kellberg (1959) Recent subsurface investigations in the Wells Creek structure, Stewart County, Tennessee, Geological Society of America Bulletin 70(12, Part 2), p. 1765, Geological Society of America (GSA), Boulder, CO

W H Bucher (1963) Cryptoexplosion structures caused from without or from within the earth? ("astroblemes" or "geoblemes?"), American Journal of Science 261(7), p. 597-649, Kline Geology Laboratory, Yale University, New Haven, CT, url

R S Dietz (1963) Cryptoexplosion structures; a discussion, American Journal of Science 261(7), p. 650-664, Kline Geology Laboratory, Yale University, New Haven, CT, url

T E Bunch, A J Cohen (1964) Shock deformation of quartz from two meteorite craters, Geological Society of America 75, p. 1263-1266, pdf

R G Stearns, P S Marsh (1965) Preliminary conclusions from a regional gravity survey of the wells creek basin structure, houston and stewart counties, tennessee (abs.), Journal of the Tennessee Academy of Science 40(2), p. 67, Tennessee Academy of Science, Nashville, TN

C W Jr Wilson, R G Stearns, J T Wilcox, H A Tiedemann, P S Marsh (1966) Wells Creek Basin cryptoexplosion structure, Stewart and Houston counties, Tennessee; progress report, Special Paper - Geological Society of America, p. 266-267, Geological Society of America (GSA), Boulder, CO

J M Safford, W T Lander (1966) Manuscript of the faults of the Wells Creek Basin, Journal of the Tennessee Academy of Science 41(1), p. 38-46, Tennessee Academy of Science, Nashville, TN

C W Wilson Jr, R G Stearns (1966) Circumferential faulting around Wells Creek Basin, Houston and Stewart counties, Tennessee; a manuscript by J. M. Safford and W. T. Lander, circa 1895, Journal of the Tennessee Academy of Science 41(1), p. 37-48, Tennessee Academy of Science, Nashville, TN, url

J M Kellberg (1966) Possible tectonic origin for 'cryptoexplosion' structures; Wells Creek structure, Tennessee, Special Paper - Geological Society of America, p. 253, Geological Society of America (GSA), Boulder, CO

S M Puryear (1967) A study of the joining in and around the Wells Creek structure near Cumberland City, Tennessee, Journal of the Tennessee Academy of Science 42(2), p. 52-53, Tennessee Academy of Science, Nashville, TN

C W Jr Wilson, H A Tiedemann, R G Stearns (1968) Meteor impact as a model for Wells Creek Basin cryptoexplosive structure, Tennessee, Special Paper - Geological Society of America, p. 241, Geological Society of America (GSA), Boulder, CO, url

R G Stearns, C W Wilson Jr, H A Tiedemann, J T Wilcox, P S Marsh (1968) The Wells Creek structure, Tennessee, Shock metamorphism of natural materials, 1st Conf., Greenbelt, Md., 1966, Proc.

C W Jr Wilson, R G Sterns, H A Tiedemann, J T Wilcox, P S Marsh (1968) Geology of the Wells Creek structure, Tennessee, Bulletin - Tennessee, Division of Geology, p. 236, Tennessee Department of Conservation, Division of Geology, Nashville, TN, url

S M Puryear, R G Stearns (1969) Control of fabric of the wells creek structure by pre-existing joints, Special Paper - Geological Society of America, p. 462, Geological Society of America (GSA), Boulder, CO

R C Gilbert (1972) The Wells Creek Formation in central Tennessee, Journal of the Tennessee Academy of Science 47(2), p. 58, Tennessee Academy of Science, Nashville, TN

K L Duff, T D Ford (1984) Field meetings to the western USA 1981 & 1982, Proceedings of the Geologists' Association 95, Part 2, p. 97-148, Geologists' Association, London

E P Gurov, E P Gurova (1987) Impact structures on Earth's surface (in Russian), Geologicheskii Zhurnal 47, p. 117-124

G J Dudek (1993) Depositional environment, diagenetic history, and source rock potential of the Middle Ordovician Wells Creek (Glenwood) Formation, Ashtabula County, Ohio, Depositional environment, diagenetic history, and source rock potential of the Middle Ordovician Wells Creek (Glenwood) Formation, Ashtabula County, Ohio, p. 109

A M Fielder, A J Roman-Mas, M W Bennett (1994) Reconnaissance of ground-water quality at selected wells in the Beaver Creek watershed, Shelby, Fayette, Tipton, and Haywood counties, West Tennessee, July to August 1992, Open-File Report - U. S. Geological Survey, p. 28-28, 4 sheets, U. S. Geological Survey, Reston, VA, url

H A Tiedemann (1997) The Wells Creek structure, Tennessee; from heaven or hell?, Circular - Oklahoma Geological Survey 100, Kenneth S Johnson, Jock A Campbell (ed.), p. 265-271, University of Oklahoma, Norman, OK

W B McKinnon (1997) Planetary geology: extreme cratering, Science 276(5317), p. 1346-1348, American Association for the Advancement of Science, Washington, DC, url

D Heymann, T E Yancey, W S Wolbach, M H Thiemens, E A Johnson, D Roach, S Moecker (1998) Geochemical markers of the Cretaceous-Tertiary boundary event at Brazos River, Texas, USA, Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta 62(1), p. 173-181, url

T H See, J Wagstaff, V Yang, F Horz, G A McKay (1998) Compositional variation and mixing of impact melts on microscopic scales, Meteoritics & Planetary Science 33(4), p. 937-948, Meteoritical Society, Fayetteville, AR, url

J C Wynn (2002) Mapping an iron-meteorite impact site with a magnetometer, and implications for the probability of a catastrophic impact on Earth, Journal of Environmental & Engineering Geophyiscs 7(4), p. 143-150, url

J R H Ford, W Orchiston, R Clendening (2012) The Wells Creek meteorite impact site and changing views on impact cratering, Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage 15(3), p. 159-178, url