{"id":756131,"date":"2026-06-24T00:27:21","date_gmt":"2026-06-24T00:27:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/756131\/"},"modified":"2026-06-24T00:27:21","modified_gmt":"2026-06-24T00:27:21","slug":"pilbaras-north-pole-dome-confirmed-again-to-be-worlds-oldest-known-asteroid-crater","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/756131\/","title":{"rendered":"Pilbara’s North Pole Dome confirmed again to be world’s oldest known asteroid crater"},"content":{"rendered":"

Scientists have dated a crater in the Australian outback at 3 billion years old, making it the world’s oldest known site of an asteroid impact.<\/p>\n

The North Pole Dome, about 1,600 kilometres north of Perth, was the source of controversy last year<\/a> when it was reported as the oldest in the world, a claim debunked by another group of scientists a month later.<\/p>\n

The debate continues as advanced dating techniques used a second time removed the uncertainty, while another expert still disputes the claim.<\/p>\n

\"Two<\/p>\n

Advanced techniques were used to calculate the time of asteroid impact. (Supplied: Curtin University)<\/p>\n

Curtin University lead author Chris Kirkland said the first study found the site was an ancient impact but the exact age was uncertain.<\/p>\n

“[The second time] we went and looked into the rocks themselves, and looked at the individual little crystals within the rock, and we found these really unusual skeletal grains,” he said.<\/p>\n

“We were able to date the age of those very special grains that relate to the impact event.”<\/p>\n

The key evidence to track the time of impact came from zircon, a tiny mineral capable of keeping geological time for billions of years.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Chris Kirkland was the lead author of the study. (Supplied: Curtin University)<\/p>\n

“Some zircons at North Pole Dome have unusual branching, skeletal shapes,” Professor Kirkland said.<\/p>\n

“We interpret these as impact-modified crystals, formed when older zircon was disrupted, partly recrystallised, and in places regrown during the intense heating caused by the impact.”<\/p>\n

Professor Kirkland said to confirm the result the team analysed a second mineral, apatite, which formed as hot fluids moved through the shock-damaged rocks.<\/p>\n

This independent dating method produced the same age.<\/p>\n

Academics dispute the study<\/p>\n

Last year, when the crater was discovered and scientists from Curtin University found it to be the oldest documented crater, other experts disputed the findings.<\/p>\n

Harvard University postdoctoral fellow Alec Brenner was one, and said the latest study also did not properly date the North Pole Dome impact structure.<\/p>\n

“We’ve already documented shatter cones in nearby 2.77-billion-year-old rocks,” Mr Brenner said.<\/p>\n

“That alone requires the impact happened after 2.77 billion years ago.<\/p>\n

“While the new study dismisses this observation because these rocks ‘have not been dated’, they are straightforwardly correlated to nearby rocks that have been dated.”<\/p>\n

\"Tiny<\/p>\n

Tiny zircon crystals were used for the study. (Supplied: Curtin University)<\/p>\n

Mr Brenner said the long history of the Pilbara region had no shortage of complexity, including cryptic hydrothermal events that could form the zircon used to determine the time of impact.<\/p>\n

“Seeing an unknown fluid flow event does not mean it resulted from an impact,” he said.<\/p>\n

“The lead author has also worked on other craters where similar dated fluid flow events were clearly non-impact-related. Most are not.<\/p>\n

“So I’d suggest they’ve dated an undocumented hydrothermal episode in the area.”<\/p>\n

Crater history in WA<\/p>\n

The previous record for the world’s oldest crater was also in WA at Yarrabubba, in the Midwest<\/a>.<\/p>\n

This crater was said to be an impact 2.2 to 2.3 billion years ago.<\/p>\n

“So we are doing another 750 million years older,” Professor Kirkland said of the North Pole Dome crater’s age.<\/p>\n

“We can put these ages about and say the numbers, but if you stop to think about it, it is truly mind-boggling.”\"Rock<\/p>\n

Rock formations grown on the asteroid impact. (Supplied: Curtin University)<\/p>\n

He said the rocks they studied are similar to story books that tell the story of the planet’s past.<\/p>\n

“It is quite enthralling, and the fact that you can look at the chemistry of these mineral grains to say something about an event that happened in a split second three billion years ago is really amazing,” he said.<\/p>\n

The possibility of even older craters remaining undocumented was not written off by Professor Kirkland.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Scientists have dated a crater in the Australian outback at 3 billion years old, making it the world’s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":756132,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[2726,59997,64,63,8760,8782,361907,361906,128,285,45,361908,287308],"class_list":["post-756131","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-space","tag-asteroid","tag-asteroid-impact","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-curtin-university","tag-harvard-university","tag-north-pole-dome","tag-pilbara-dome","tag-science","tag-space","tag-wa-news","tag-what-is-an-asteroid","tag-zircon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/756131","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=756131"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/756131\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/756132"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=756131"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=756131"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=756131"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}