Henbury Meteorites Conservation Reserve is a protected area in the Northern Territory

Northern Territory

The Northern Territory is a federal territory of Australia, occupying much of the centre of the mainland continent, as well as the central northern regions...

 of Australia

Australia

Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

. The reserve is located 145 kilometres south west of Alice Springs and contains twelve craters, which were formed when a fragmented meteorite hit the earth’s surface.

Henbury is one of five meteorite impact sites in Australia associated with actual meteorite fragments and one of the world's best preserved examples of a small crater field.
At Henbury there are 13 to 14 craters ranging from 7 to 180 metres in diameter and up to 15 metres in depth that were formed when the meteor broke up before impact. Several tonnes of iron-nickel fragments have been recovered from the site. The site has been dated to 4.2±1.9 thousand years ago based on the cosmogenic ¹⁴C terrestrial age of the meteorite.

The craters are named for Henbury Station, a nearby cattle station named in 1875 for the family home of its founders at Henbury

Henbury, Dorset

Henbury is a hamlet in the civil parish of Sturminster Marshall in Dorset, England. It lies on the A31 road.Henbury House is a classical Georgian house built in 1770. In the 19th century the estate was held by the Parke family...

 in Dorset

Dorset

Dorset , is a county in South West England on the English Channel coast. The county town is Dorchester which is situated in the south. The Hampshire towns of Bournemouth and Christchurch joined the county with the reorganisation of local government in 1974...

, England. The craters were discovered in 1899 by the manager of the station, then went uninvestigated until interest was stirred when the Karoonda meteorite

Karoonda meteorite

The Karoonda meteorite fell to earth on November 25, 1930 at 10:53 pm near the South Australian town of Karoonda.The CK chondrites were named for this meteorite.-External links:**...

fell on South Australia in 1930. The Meteorite Craters at Henbury Central Australia by A.R. Alderman was published in 1932 detailing the scientific investigations of the site. Numerous studies have been undertaken since.

Cultural Significance

The Henbury crater filed is considered a sacred site to the Arrernte Aboriginal people and would have impacted during human habitation of the area. J.M. Mitchell said that older Aboriginal people would not camp within a couple of miles of the Henbury craters, referring to them as chindu china waru chingi yabu, roughly translating to sun walk fire devil rock. An elder Aboriginal man that accompanied Mitchell to the site explained that Aboriginal people would not drink rainwater that collected in the craters, fearing the "fire-devil" would fill them with a piece of iron. The man claimed his paternal grandfather had seen the fire-devil and that he came from the sun. A story was recorded by Charles Mountford that attributed the craters to a menstruating lizard-woman who discarded blood-soaked soil, forming the bowl-shape of the craters and giving the soil a red hue. The Parks & Wildlife Commission of the Northern Territory give the Arrernte name for the crater field as Tatyeye Kepmwere (or Tatjakapara) and state "some of the mythologies for the area are known but will only be used for interpretation purposes after agreement by the Aboriginal custodians of the site".

External links

• Henbury meteorites conservation reserve