Wabar impact craters
Cráteres de impacto de Wabar
- Date
- 1932 · confidence medium
- Place
- Wabar, Rub al-Khali, Riyadh Province, Saudi Arabia
- Credited to
- Harry St John Philby
- Field
- Cosmos & Earth
What was discovered
Philby sought the legendary Ubar in the Rub al-Khali and found several impact craters with black silica glass and iron meteorite fragments. It is one of the few meteorite-bearing impact craters preserved in a sand desert.
Philby visited them in February 1932 and discovered their meteoritic origin; the age of the impact has been estimated very differently and is not given here. Coordinates are approximate.
What it led to
- studies of impact glass and meteorite craters
- debate on the age of the event and the identity of Wabar with the Ubar of legend
- a reference in the impact geology of Arabia