Road Trip: Arizona-Meteor Crater, Winslow, AZ

METEOR CRATER National Monument

On our way to Peoria, AZ we stopped to see the Meteor Crater in Winslow, AZ. It's a place we've passed no less than a couple dozen times in the last twenty years, but for some reason we've never stopped.

It's only 6 miles off Highway 40, just a short diversion from the road trip. The building built next to the crater is quite large and houses a decent sized museum dedicated to things falling from the sky.

History:

"Approximately 50,000 years ago, on a continuous plain extending for miles in the high desert plateau of Northern Arizona, out of the northeastern sky, a pinpoint of light grew rapidly into a brilliant fireball. This body was probably broken off from an asteroid during an ancient collision in the main asteroid belt (between the planets, Mars and Jupiter) some half billion years ago. Hurtling about 40,000 miles per hour, it was on a rendezvous course with earth. In seconds, it passed through the earth's atmosphere with little loss of velocity or mass."

"The result of these violent conditions was the excavation of a giant bowl shaped cavity. In less than a few seconds, a crater was carved into this once flat rocky plain. During its formation, over 175 million tons of limestone and sandstone were abruptly thrown out to form a continuous blanket of debris surrounding the crater for a distance of over a mile."

METEOR CRATER National Monument

OUR REVIEW: We didn't get much of a chance to really spend time in the museum, but it was pretty impressive. Lots of interactive exhibits explaining the phenomenom of debris from space and the differences. There is also an actual remnant of the meteor on display--a significant size.

The view of the crater is amazing and the private owners have successfully given the viewer a great perspective of the crater. It doesn't "seem" as big as it is, until you look through the various telescopes and see the 6 foot tall astronaut at the bottom, or the boiler, crane and a manhole that was explored. Of course, they seem tiny through the viewfinder and almost invisible to the naked eye, reinforcing the actual size of the crater.

In all honesty, we didnt' spend half the time there that we wanted. My four little ones, the oldest being 6.5 years old, were tired at 2 in the afternoon when we arrived and had little patience for exploring the museum. It was a little pricey, though for myself and my 4 kids it was only $22.00. If my girls were all 6 and over, it would have been $39.

It is definitely worth the stop; where else can you see where such an event has occured? Be sure to stop when you have time to properly explore the wealth of information offered at the museum.

FUN FACTS:

On August 8, 1964, a pair of commercial pilots in a Cessna 150 flew into the crater for a closer look but were unable to climb out due to downdrafts. They ended up circling the interior until their fuel was exhausted and crash-landed. They survived their ordeal and a small portion of the wreckage not removed from the crash site remains visible to this day-Wikipedia

• Featured in the movie Starman. In this, a large spherical shaped UFO hovers over the crater.
• Featured in the movie Damnation Alley. In this, it is featured as a nuclear blast crater.
• Featured in a montage on the cover of the Midnight Oil album Red Sails in the Sunset. The crater is superimposed several times over Sydney Harbor suggesting the aftermath of a nuclear strike.
• In the novel The Martian War, Dr. Moreau and Percival Lowell take a crashed Martian scout to see the crater. It reminds the Martian of its home.
• In the novel 3001: The Final Odyssey, Frank Poole views a computer-generated model of the crater, and remembers exploring it as a child.

FUN STUFF RELATED TO METEOR CRATER:

Have some 3D glasses? View THIS IMAGE

Barringer Meteorite Crater Official Site

Play the Crater GAME