If you are looking at a geographic atlas or browsing the Internet on one of the many global satellites available, You can come across many curiosities in Earth’s geography. One of them is located in Canada, in the eastern part of Hudson Bay. Here, north of Leeds Bay, In the distinctive “finger” extending south from the bay, you can see a huge circular structure.
A perfectly circular arc, it cannot escape the attention of the attentive observer. The truth is that it is surprising Its almost perfect circular shape, While one would expect a rough coastline as is often the case.
We are facing the Nastabuka arch, The mystery of the cause of this circular shape has stimulated many studies and expeditions.
There have been many hypotheses about the formation of the mysterious Nastabuka Arch in Hudson Bay (northeastern Canada), and there have been heated debates about its geological origin.
Huge asteroid?
One hypothesis that has been mentioned in the past is the asteroid impact hypothesis. Also in Canada, a few thousand kilometers east of the Nastapoca Arch, It is the “Eye of Quebec”, Lake Manicougan, A large freshwater basin with a diameter of about 70 km, It has a very distinctive ring shape resulting from the collision of a huge meteorite.
But the first thing that catches your eye when you compare the dimensions between Nastabuka Arch and Lake Manicogan is the size. The Canadian Lake has a diameter of about 70 km, while the Nastapoca Arch, if supplemented with a compass, has a diameter of 450 km.
We would therefore encounter a meteorite of unimaginable proportions. However, no method is ruled out, and geologists have been trying for decades to determine whether this structure is specific It is actually the result of a horrific meteorite impact, but they haven’t found any evidence.
Field geological study conducted in the 1970s No evidence of impact, such as molten rock, radial fractures, etc., was detected.
Asteroid hypothesis Therefore it has been put aside for now, Although some scientists have speculated that traces of the asteroid impact were erased by geological processes, New hypotheses are being explored.
The result of ancient continental collision?
today, Geologists generally believe that the arc is the result of continental collision. According to an article in NASAan episode of mountain formation 2 billion years old It’s called the Trans-Hudson Orogeny, which is believed to have led to the first formation of the North American continent.
According to this theory, the Nastapoca Arch would be the relic remaining today Tectonic plate boundaries are arc-shaped and would therefore have a tectonic origin.
Based on numerical modeling studies and regional geological studies and in the absence of evidence of the impact of an extraterrestrial body, There is currently a general consensus on this theory of tectonic origin.
