Spider - Hypervelocity Impact Crater

Alternate Names
Local Language
Coordinates 16° 44' 26" S; 126° 5' 26" E
Notes
  1. North Western Australia, N of both the Goat Paddock and Wolf Creek structures.
Country Australia
Region Western Australia
Date Confirmed 1980
Notes
  1. Confirmed based on the presence of shatter cones, central uplift, and peripheral thrust sheets affirm this to be an impact site (Harms et al., 1980).
Buried? No
Drilled? No
Target Type Sedimentary
Notes
  1. Sandstone and minor finer grained rocks of the Early Proterozoic Kimberly Group (Shoemaker and Shoemaker, 1985).
Sub-Type Quartziticsandstone
Apparent Crater Diameter (km) 13 km
Age (Ma) 580 - 900
Notes :
  1. 580-900 Ma based on erosional and stratigraphic constraints (Abels, 2005); the depth of erosion indicates an age greater than that of the Goat Paddock crater (Harms et al., 1980) and most likely of Precambrian age. *Maximum age is poorly constrained.

Method :
  1. Stratigraphy
Impactor Type Unknown

Advanced Data Fields

Notes

Erosion
7
  1. Apparently exposed at a level considerably below the original crater floor (Harms et al., 1980). Evidence for at least 1 km of denudation in this region (Garvin, 1987, pers. Comm.).
Final Rim Diameter
Unknown
Apparent Rim Diameter
13 km
  1. Diameter is 13 x 11 km and defined by normal faults and monoclines (Abels, 2005). (Shoemaker and Shoemaker, 1985)
Rim Reliability Index
1
  1. Defined by an outwardly radiating pattern of thrust sheets (ridges) that form a crudely circular pattern. Because of deep erosion, this morphology may represent only the interior of the central uplift (Garvin, 1987, pers. Comm.).
Crater Morphology
Complex
Central Uplift Diameter
5km
Central Uplift Height
Unknown
Uplift Reliability Index
Structural Uplift
Unknown
Thickness of Seds
Target Age
Precambrian
Marine
No
Impactor Type
Other Shock Metamorphism
Shock-twinned zircon and shock-twinned xenotime.
  1. Shock-twinned zircon and shock-twinned xenotime reported from shatter cones of quartzite by Cox et al. (2021a, 2021b). "
Shatter Cones
Yes
  1. Nice imags of shatter cones in Cox et al. (2021). Shatter cones in area ~5 km in diameter (Harms et al., 1980). Shatter cones are well-developed in both the central uplift and the surrounding thrust-sheets over an area ~2 km in diameter (Shoemaker and Shoemaker, 1996). Large (~50 cm in length), well-developed, shatter cones occur in quartzite from the central uplift (Shoemaker and Shoemaker, 1996).
Planar Fractures
Yes
  1. PFand FF in Qz (Cox et al. 2021)
Planar Deformation Features
Yes
  1. PDF in quartz grains indexed by U-stage (Cox et al. 2021).
Diaplectic Glass
No
Coesite
No
Stisovite
No
Crater Fill
  1. Polymict impact breccia reported by Cox et al. (2021). Neither crater-fill impactites nor dykes have been identified (Shoemaker and Shoemaker, 1996) (Abels, 2005).
Proximal Ejecta
Distal Ejecta
Dykes
Volume of Melt
Depth of Melting

References

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E M Shoemaker, C S Shoemaker (1988) The Spider impact structure, Western Australia, Abstracts with Programs - Geological Society of America 20(7), p. 147, Geological Society of America (GSA), Boulder, CO

Andreas Abels (2001) Integrated remote sensing of the Spider impact structure, Australia; potential effects of the morphostructural setting on cratering, Abstracts of Papers Submitted to the Lunar and Planetary Science Conference 32, p. Abstract no. 1408, Lunar and Planetary Science Conference, Houston, TX, pdf

J F McHone, D J Roddy, C S Shoemaker, K K Williams, J E Klemaszewski (2002) Spider impact structure, Western Australia imaged with space shuttle radar, Abstracts of Papers Submitted to the Lunar and Planetary Science Conference 33, p. Abstract 1990, Lunar and Planetary Science Conference, Houston, TX, pdf

A Abels (2005) Spider impact structure, Kimberley Plateau, Western Australia: interpretations of formation mechanism and age based on integrated map-scale data, Australian Journal of Earth Sciences 52(4-5), p. 653-664, url, doi:10.1080/08120090500170310

M A Cox, A J Cavosie, K Miljković, P A Bland, T Kenkmann (2018) The search for shocked zircon at Spider impact structure, Western Australia, Abstracts of Papers Submitted to the 49th Lunar and Planetary Science Conference, p. 1890, pdf

S Staffieri, A Coletta, M L Battagliere, M Virelli (2019) Spider, Australia, Encyclopedic Atlas of Terrestrial Impact Craters, p. 301-303, Springer, Cham, url, doi:https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-05451-9_77

M A Cox, A J Cavosie, M H Poelchau, T Kenkmann, K Miljković, P A Bland (2021) Asymmetric shock deformation at the Spider impact structure, Western Australia, Meteoritics & Planetary Science 56(2), p. 331-351, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd, url, doi:https://doi.org/10.1111/maps.13621

V. Aneeshkumar, G. K. Indu, M. Santosh, S. James, Saranya R. Chandran, Devika Padmakumar, K. S. Sajinkumar (2022) Terrestrial impact craters track the voyage of lithospheric plates, Geological Journal 57(9), doi:10.1002/gj.4512