'Meteor Strike', Kosi Bay, Maputaland, South Africa: No Evidence for an Impact Origin

摘要

In recent years, rumours about the existence of a possible meteorite crater in Maputaland (northeastern KwaZulu-Natal Province, South Africa) had been heard. A site marked "Meteor Strike" (Fig. I) is even found on the 1:50 000 "Kosi Bay" topographic sheet (of the Trigonometrical Survey Office, Pretoria) at 26 56.6' S and 32 47.0' E, directly adjacent to a mission station marked on the sheet as "Star of the Sea". In response to initial enquiries by our group, several colleagues from South African universities and from the Council for Geoscience remarked that they were aware of rumours about this structure, but could not provide further detail. In addition, staff of the Geography Department, University of Natal in early 1999 reported, in correspondence, the possible existence of two impact sites in this area.However, our investigations of the geological literature (such as explanations of regional geological maps) did not yield any information. Consequently we decided to investigate the basis of these rumours by undertaking a short expedition to the Kosi Bay area to study these sites.