Earth May Have Had A Ring Like Saturn, Claims Geologist

Andrew Tomkins, a geologist from Monash University has come up with evidence that Earth may have had a ring, in a paper published a week back in Earth & Planetary Science Letters.

It is claimed that such a ring formed around the earth around 466 million years ago. This ring existed for a few tens of millions of years.

The geologist and his team have based their claim on 21 craters from this period that formed close to the equator. They feel, the asteroid’s debris from the ring rained down onto Earth, creating the pattern of craters, sediments and tsunamis over several tens of millions of years.

Apart from Saturn, which has visible rings around it, Jupiter, Neptune and Uranus have less visible rings.

It is speculated that Earth destroyed and captured a passing asteroid around 466 million years ago forming the ring around it.

At that time, the continents were in different positions, much of North America, Europe and Australia were close to the equator, whereas Africa and South America were at higher southern latitudes.

The ring would have been around the equator. The ring would have shaded parts of Earth’s surface, which may have caused global cooling, as less sunlight reached the planet’s surface.

Around 465 million years ago, earth began cooling dramatically and by 445 million years ago it was in the Hirnantian Ice Age.