An impact event is the collision of a large meteorite, asteroid, comet, or other celestial object with the Earth or another planet. Throughout recorded history, hundreds of minor impact events (and exploding bolides) have been reported, with some occurrences causing deaths, injuries, property damage or other significant localised consequences. There have also been major impact events throughout the Earth's history which severely disrupted the environment and caused mass extinctions.
Impact events have been a plot and background element in science fiction since knowledge of real impacts became established in the scientific mainstream.
Read more about Impact Event: Sizes and Frequencies, Geology of Impacts, Pleistocene Impact Events, Holocene Impact Events, Impact-caused Extinction Events, Non-terrestrial Impacts, End of Civilization
Famous quotes containing the words impact and/or event:
“Conquest is the missionary of valour, and the hard impact of military virtues beats meanness out of the world.”
—Walter Bagehot (1826–1877)
“The event combined with
Beams leading up to it for the look of force adapted to the wiser
Usages of age, but it’s both there
And not there, like washing or sawdust in the sunlight,
At the back of the mind, where we live now.”
—John Ashbery (b. 1927)