[Hill]

People had lived in North Carolina, and other places, and never though much about the many small shallow lakes and ponds in the vicinity except to figure out ways to drain them and plant crops there. That changed in 1930 when the first aerial photographs of the area were taken.

The lakes were then discovered to be of about the same shape and orientation, and people began to speculate about their origin. One strong contender for awhile has been the bays are formed by winds, and or water currents. The other strong contender is that they were formed by a large meteor or comet that exploded high in the atmosphere and spewed chunks of itself over much of North America.

Recent evidence strongly supports the fragmented comet theory. Rather than duplicate everything I've gathered at the Google Earth Community Forums, I'll provide a link: Google Earth Community: The mystery of the Carolina Bays
The initial post has some links itself. The Carolina Bays has a video of a conference about event which is rather long but may be of perticular interest because it contains current information (May, 2007).

[Mercedes Benzene]

WOW!
I've seen those before from airplanes! I had absolutely no idea that they had any significance. I simply assumed that they were some sort of local farming habit... not too much unlike center pivot irrigation.
It's interesting to know that they are indeed the result of something else. Based on what I've quickly read about them, I seem to lean towards the meteor theory. The simple fact that they extend out of the Carolinas makes it seem more feasible than some water/tide anomaly.

Thank you so much for sharing this!

[freeztar]

My first objection to the extraterrestrial origin of Bays was brought up by the second to last post in the GEC thread. Why do we not see oval craters on the moon and Mars?

Of course, the "black mat" is a strong piece of evidence to dismiss.

I'm on the fence here...so far...

I do know that The Carolina Bays here in GA support plant communities found nowhere else in the state.

More to come...

[Mercedes Benzene]

My first objection to the extraterrestrial origin of Bays was brought up by the second to last post in the GEC thread. Why do we not see oval craters on the moon and Mars?

The moon doesn't have an atmosphere... so meteors don't break up into fragments which then fly at an angle towards the earth. Mars? Idk.

[freeztar]

Originally Posted by Mercedes Benzene

The moon doesn't have an atmosphere... so meteors don't break up into fragments which then fly at an angle towards the earth. Mars? Idk.

The atmosphere indeed can cause comets and rocks to fragment, but does not account for oval craters.

Check out the original posting at the GEC:

" One objection to the idea of an impact origin for the lunar craters was the fact that all lunar craters are round. Astronomers assumed that most meteorites would have struck the moon at oblique angles, producing elongated craters. Barringer, however, had experimented by firing rifle bullets into rocks and mud, and had discovered that a projectile arriving at an oblique angle would nevertheless make a round hole. In 1923, Barringer's 12-year-old son Richard published an article in Popular Astronomy, using his father's rifle experiments to argue for the impact origin of the lunar craters; Barringer himself repeated the arguments a short time later in the Scientific American."

THE BARRINGER METEORITE CRATER

[Hill]

One objection to the idea of an impact origin for the lunar craters was the fact that all lunar craters are round

One hypothesis about the formation of the Carolina Bays proposes that they formed such large ovals in some areas, not just because of a strike by pieces of a disintegrating comet fragments. The resulting lakes were so large because the glowing hot material, coming in at a steep angle, struck a boggy area and the steam created literally exploded large holes out of the soft wet substrate. Strikes on drier ground had much less effect. A RE-EVALUATION OF THE EXTRATERRESTRIAL ORIGIN OF THE CAROLINA BAYS

Craters aren't necessarily round, especially those formed from low angle impacts.


From Straight Dope Staff Report: Why are craters always round?

[Tormod]

There are numerous examples of oval craters on the Moon and Mars.

Here is a nice render based on spacecraft images:
Terragen renderings of Mars

[freeztar]

Good links guys!
I had never heard of oval craters on the moon or Mars.
So what does this say for Barringer's theory that shockwaves create round craters even at oblique angles? Why did he achieve these results with bullets here on earth?

Also, would the oblique angle account for such a large area of distribution?

Another theory that a colleague and I were discussing yesterday was glacial winds. In much the same way that loehrs are created, a receding glacier could have created gale force winds that carved out uni-directional divets in the topography.

Still on the fence...

[Hill]

In much the same way that loehrs are created, a receding glacier could have created gale force winds that carved out uni-directional divets in the topography.

Possible I suppose, but the heaviest concentration of bays is far from the location of glacial fronts. The winds would likely be created from cold heavy air from above the glacier rushing downslope and, I would suspect, creating strong winds right near the glacial face.

Also, we have to apply the new evidence of carbon layers at these sites which contain lumps of glasslike carbon , carbon spherules , and magnetic grains rich in iridium. This strengthens the evidence for impact rather that wind. Do you agree?



More about this layer from ScienceDaily: Extraterrestrial Impact Likely Source Of Sudden Ice Age Extinctions

[freeztar]

Originally Posted by Hill

Also, we have to apply the new evidence of carbon layers at these sites which contain lumps of glasslike carbon , carbon spherules , and magnetic grains rich in iridium. This strengthens the evidence for impact rather that wind. Do you agree?

Yes, I agree that the evidence of iridium and carbon spherules make a convincing argument, if not a hands down declaration of proof.

Where exactly were these "black mats" found? Are they found at all of the Bays, or only some in a certain area?

Something that I have not seen mentioned yet is multiple forces creting these Bays. Perhaps the original impact craters were later scoured by wind and other errosive forces?