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Craters at Belmont?
Hello all,
The Tunguska Event is really a fascinating thing. Closer to home I have long puzzled at the three or perhaps four round lagoon/swamps on the peninsula that is the Belmont - Blacksmiths area south of newcastle in NSW. On old maps they are called;
"Big Hole" 151 39 49 E, 33 02 39 S
"Middle Hole" 151 39 41 E, 33 03 14 S
and "Little Hole" 151 39 22 E, 33 03 36 S
There also may be a "remnant" hole centred at 151 39 04 E, 33 04 10S
To the North East there has been so much utter destruction of the sand hills due to sand mining for rutlie in the 60's to the removal of whole hills for sand for building that it is not recognisable.
The peninsula is sand bed formed at the end of the last ice age. These holes lie in a roughly NE to SW line about 3.8 km long. The largest and most northerly is about 950m x 640m in size, and all are very shallow - <1m depth.
Google earth gives a nice, high resolution view of the area.
Of course the astronomer in me sees meteoric or cometary craters! Any ideas and speculations about their origin would be interesting so I put it out there to everyone.
Richard
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