An Age of Magic

When outer space and Scotland collided

I wonder what it would feel like to experience the power of 1000 nuclear bombs going off all at once? of course, none of us would live to tell the tale if such an occurrence happened near enough to us.

But that is what happened when a meteorite fell from space and landed in north-west Scotland 1.2 billion years ago. Actually the tourist resort of Ullapool stands right in the middle of the crater! thousands of tourists visit this spot each year to view the unusual rock formations.  Academics from Aberdeen and Oxford universities are convinced it was a meteorite that caused the highly unusual rock formations along a 30-mile stretch of coastline.

Previously, it was thought the intricate deposits of brightly coloured and rare minerals found on the Stoer Peninsula were created by volcanic activity. But geologists who spent two years studying tiny samples of rock from the mountain Stac Fada believe they have identified fragments of meteorite.  They say the centre of the crater would be where Ullapool now stands.

Space rubble, including meteorites, left over from the creation of the solar system has been landing on Earth for billions of years. Let’s just hope that earth has seen the last of the really big ones for now!

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