Trajectory ❖ ❖ ❖

The trajectory of the impacting asteroid is another issue of considerable debate and still unresolved. Historically, circular plan views of impact craters confounded many investigators who assumed a circular crater requires a vertical impact. They wondered why more craters are not elliptical. Gilbert and Barringer both realized that 45° impacts are the most probable trajectories for meteoritic material. Yet Gilbert, like many of his contemporaries, mistakenly thought a 45° impact produces an oval crater (Hoyt, 1987). Barringer, on the other hand, realized that a 45° impact will produce a round crater (Hoyt, 1987). Despite this insight, Barringer, like Gilbert, initially assumed that the northern Arizona impact had been vertical or nearly vertical and that the asteroid was buried beneath the center of the crater floor.