The S2 impact
An asteroid up to 200 times the mass of the dinosaur-killer strikes Earth — and life shrugs it off.
- When
- Known to
- ± 20 million years
- Era
- Paleoarchean, Archean
The thickest of the Barberton spherule beds records a body perhaps 50 to 200 times the mass of the Chicxulub impactor, striking around 3.26 billion years ago. It boiled the upper ocean, blanketed the world in rock vapour and drove enormous tsunamis. Remarkably, evidence suggests the microbial biosphere recovered quickly and may even have been fertilised by the iron and phosphorus stirred up.