Scientists Confirm 3-Km Silverpit Crater Was Formed by 160-Meter Asteroid

Q: Could the 100-meter mega-tsunami that devastated the ancient North Sea happen again if a 160-meter asteroid struck today?

Yes — in principle, a 160-meter asteroid striking the North Sea today could generate a tsunami of that scale locally. The Silverpit study shows that an impact of roughly that size, hitting shallow water at a low angle, was capable of producing waves more than 100 meters high near the impact zone. But that does not mean a 100-meter wall of water would hit every modern coastline around the North Sea. Tsunami height depends heavily on impact angle, speed, water depth, seafloor shape and distance from the strike. The modeled 100-meter figure is best understood as a near-source “mega-tsunami,” with wave heights likely dropping as the tsunami spread outward. Coastal flooding could still be severe across parts of Britain, the Netherlands, Belgium, Germany and Denmark. The bigger question is likelihood. A 160-meter object is large enough to cause regional devastation, but impacts of that size are rare, typically separated by many thousands of years on average. Planetary-defense agencies track potentially hazardous asteroids, and NASA’s DART mission has already shown that deflection is possible in at least some cases if an object is found early enough. The main risk is late detection, especially for dark or poorly observed objects. So the ancient event could happen again in physical terms, but it is very unlikely in the near term, and today humanity is better equipped to spot and potentially deflect such a threat before impact.

3 articles · Updated · ScienceDaily · Oct 21

New seismic images and shocked quartz and feldspar from an oil well have confirmed that the buried Silverpit structure in the North Sea is an asteroid-impact crater, ending more than two decades of dispute.
Researchers say a roughly 160-meter object struck the seabed 43 million to 46 million years ago at a shallow angle from the west, creating a crater about 3 kilometers wide and a 1.5-kilometer-high plume.
Computer simulations indicate the impact then generated a tsunami more than 100 meters high, showing how even a relatively modest ocean strike could unleash severe regional damage.
Silverpit lies about 700 meters below the seabed, 80 miles off Yorkshire, and now joins a rare class of preserved impact sites—around 33 identified beneath the ocean and about 200 confirmed on land.
The Nature Communications study gives scientists a well-preserved case for examining subsurface impact damage and refining models of how future asteroid collisions could affect Earth.