Suevite
“Impact melt breccia from asteroid strikes”
Suevite is a unique breccia formed during meteorite impacts, containing a chaotic mix of shocked rock fragments, partially melted clasts, and glassy melt particles called fladen. It records the unimaginable violence of bolide impacts where pressures exceed anything produced by normal geological processes.
shocked quartz, glass (impact melt), feldspar, rock fragments with planar deformation features, coesite (high-pressure silica)
Nördlinger Ries (Germany — type locality), Chicxulub Crater (Mexico), Sudbury (Canada), Vredefort Crater (South Africa)
4-6 (variable)
The town of Nördlingen in Germany is built inside a 15-million-year-old impact crater, and many of its medieval buildings — including the church — are constructed from suevite quarried from the crater itself.
Test Your Knowledge
What microscopic feature in suevite provides definitive proof of a meteorite impact origin?
Related Specimens
Want to identify rocks yourself?