After 30 years of studying Egypt’s Western Desert, Boston University’s Remote Sensing Center Director Farouk El-Baz discovered the remains of the largest crater in the Great Sahara Desert Feb. 20. Alongside BU colleague Eman Ghoneim, El-Baz was studying satellite images of the southwest part of Egypt during President’s Day weekend when he made the discovery.
The crater was discovered using multispectral and radar images. El-Baz said he named the crater “Kebira,” the Arabic word for “large,” because of its size. According to El-Baz, a research professor, the structure is “twenty miles in diameter,” which means it could hold “70,000 football fields inside it.” Because of the crater’s size, El-Baz said he has been asked frequently why the crater was not discovered long ago.
“[The crater went undiscovered] because it is situated at the edge of a plateau,” El-Baz said, “and its rooks are made from the same material as the plateau.”
El-Baz said a discovery of this size will not only affect the Remote Sensing Center and the earth sciences department, but will also generate future research. According to Ghoneim, a research associate at the Center, the discovery of the crater explains the existence of the “Desert Glass,” or Silica fragments, strewn about the desert surface.
“It also points attention to the region as a potential area of visible remains of impact structures on the Earth, which would have lasted because of the lack of vegetation,” she said.
According to a BU news release, since the crater’s shape resembles double-ringed craters on the moon, El-Baz believes the crater may also lead to further research in “comparative planetology.”
The discovery of Kebira has prompted positive responses from BU faculty and students.
“Many geology, geography and archaeology students have already spoken to me in the hallways about the discovery and plans for field work,” El-Baz said. “Many said, ‘I would like to go.'”
Besides excitement among students, the discovery added to the reputation of the Remote Sensing Center as a leading organization in this field. Established in 1986, the Center was recognized by NASA in 1997 as a “Center of Excellence in Remote Sensing,” according to the press release.
El-Baz and Ghoneim, whose work consists mostly of studying satellite images for the exploration of groundwater in arid lands, are not stopping merely at discovering Kebira. As El-Baz said, “in science, our minds must be open to all possibilities,” and these researchers are already writing a paper on Kebira and exploring the region in depth in search for more craters.
“We are already dividing the Sahara into slices to study one-by-one in search for such structures, and we are beginning to spot some more,” Ghoneim said.
Ghoneim said she is sure there are more crater impacts, but she does not know if these will be bigger than Kebira.
“We will certainly have an answer to this question very soon,” she said.
— Alexandra Del Real
