한반도 남부에 거대한 운석이 떨어졌던 날, 경남 합천 초계분지에 관한 흥미로운 사실들

Approximately 42,000 years ago, a massive meteorite flew at tremendous speed toward what is now Hapcheon, Gyeongsangnam-do. The explosion that day created a massive scar, and someone living in the Paleolithic era in the southern Korean Peninsula witnessed the scene. Over time, the impact crater eroded and was filled with sediment, but its massive outline remains to this day. That trace is what is known today as the 'Hapcheon Chogye Basin.' Spreading across the Jeokjung-myeon and Chogye-myeon areas of Hapcheon-gun, Gyeongsangnam-do, this terrain appears deeply sunken in satellite imagery, looking as if someone had placed a giant bowl upside down on the ground. It is an elliptical basin approximately 7 kilometers from east to west and 4 kilometers from north to south, surrounded on all sides by mountain peaks ranging from 200 to 700 meters above sea level like a fence, with farmland spread out within. When viewed from the summit of Mt. Daam, famous as a paragliding launch site, it looks exactly like a volcanic crater. In fact, geologists have long viewed this basin with suspicion. However, suspicion alone could not prove it was a meteorite impact crater, as evidence known as a "shatter cone" was required for official recognition by the international scientific community. A shatter cone is a very unique rock structure that forms only when extreme shock waves, such as those from a meteorite impact, occur; it features cone-shaped streaks spreading across the rock surface like a horse's tail. On Earth, there are only two causes capable of creating this structure: meteorite impacts and nuclear explosions. And in 2020, that evidence finally emerged from deep underground in Hapcheon.