With over 190 confirmed impact craters having hit Earth, there are a plethora of interesting discoveries! A good example of this being that scientists can roughly determine the age of an impact based upon the size of the crater. Impact craters less than ten thousand years old typically have a diameter of around 330 feet. Almost all craters between 10,000 and 1 million year in age are less than 2.4 miles in diameter. For craters ages between 1 and 10 million years ago, they have a diameter of 3 miles or more. Craters with diameter 12 miles or more are all older than 10 million years ago. Knowing this, looking at the 5 largest impact craters will probably be some of the oldest in South America!

Araguainha

This is the largest impact crater in South America with a diameter of 25 miles. The Araguainha crater is located on the border of Mato Grosso and Goiás states, Brazil, between the villages of Araguainha and Ponte Branca. The crater has been dated to 254.7 million years ago, when the region might have been a shallow sea.

Serra da Cangalha

Located near the border of Maranhão State, in north/northeastern Brazil, the Serra da Cangalha impact crater that is between 7.5 and 8.1 miles in diameter. This makes this the second-largest known crater in Brazil, and the crater has age that is estimated to be about 220 million years old.

Vargeão Dome

Vargeão Dome is a meteorite crater in Santa Catarina State, Brazil, straddling the municipalities of Vargeão, Faxinal dos Guedes, and Passos Maia.[1] The crater is an almost perfectly circular depression with steep walls, 12 kilometres (7.5 mi) in diameter and up to 225 metres (738 ft) deep, relative to its rim. It is of Early Cretaceous age,[2] or about 123 ± 2 Ma.[1] The meteorite impacted on the basaltic rocks of the Serra Geral Formation (Jurassic/Cretaceous). The crater displays several concentric rings and radial faults, and an eroded central bulge. The latter consists of impact breccias and sandstones from the Botucatu/Pirambóia Formation (Cretaceous/Triassic), which have been displaced about 700 metres (2,300 ft) above their mean depth in the surrounding area. At least four post-impact lava flows have been identified between the rim and core. The impact origin of the structure is attested by the presence of shatter cones and shocked quartz grains.

Santa Marta

Located in Piauí State, northeastern Brazil, the Santa Marta crater is 6.2 miles in diameter and it is estimated to have formed between 100 and 66 million years ago, during the Late Cretaceous. Its impact origin was first proposed in 2000 based primarily on satellite remote sensing data and was confirmed more than a decade later.

Vista Alegre

Located in Coronel Vivida, Paraná State, Brazil, the Vista Alegre crater is a meteorite crater that is 5.9 miles in diameter. It has an estimated age of less than 65 million years. The area surrounding the crater is hilly, so the crater doesnt stand out.

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