How the crater was created
Arizona is best known for its giant hole in the ground, a feature that became the state’s license-plate slogan and has etched itself into the hearts of tourists around the world.
But Grand Canyon isn’t the state’s only hole in the ground that attracts hundreds of thousands of visitors each year.
Meteor Crater is a geological warm-up act to the Canyon, an interesting diversion worth visiting for an hour or so (more if you browse the gift shop or have lunch at the sandwich shop). Fifty thousand years ago, give or take a millennium, a 150-foot-wide iron-nickel meteorite slammed to Earth, killing every living thing within a few miles.
The mile-wide, 550-foot-deep gouge people see today was crafted in roughly 10 seconds when the meteorite, traveling
at 26,000 mph, crash-landed in what was then a forest of juniper and piñon pines.
Thanks to orbital physics, gravity and human-migration patterns, the meteorite hit a spot just 5 miles off the future site of a major interstate. Billboards to the east and west tout the privately owned landmark, beckoning travelers who could use a break.
The crater is more a stopover than a destination, and there’s nothing wrong with that. The space-crafted bowl draws more than 200,000 people annually, and it’s likely the vast majority have pulled over on the way to Grand Canyon or while exploring Route 66. More than a few probably stood on a corner in Winslow, Arizona, 26 miles to the east and the closest town to the crater.
Few would be disappointed by what awaits 5 miles south of Interstate 40. The two-lane road leading from the offramp to the visitor center wasn’t paved until the 1980s, turning a tooth-rattling jaunt over a washboard trail into a pleasant drive through the dusty landscape.
The road gradually climbs as it nears a rock-strewn ridge rising incongruous-
ly from the desert floor. A building emerges, stacked rectangles of red brick embedded into the ridge.
Exploring Meteor Crater
After paying for tickets inside the lower lobby, visitors take the elevator or stairs to the top level, where the story of Meteor Crater unfolds through exhibits. From a computer animation of the moment of impact to a display of NASA’s Apollo astronauts who trained there for moon landings, the crater’s history is easy to follow thanks to a well-designed flow.
Visitors also learn of Daniel Moreau Barringer, a Philadelphia mining engineer who was convinced that a fortune in iron lay just beneath the hollowed-out surface. In the early 1900s, many thought the meteorite had to be nearly as big as the hole it created.
The mining operation was a bust — you can still see remnants of the mining camp at the bottom of the crater, complete with the initial shaft — but thanks to mineral claims, the land eventually was deeded to Barringer and his family.
The Barringer heirs teamed with a rancher who owned the surrounding