Watching a program on the history channel sparked a curiosity in me to find the modern locations of events in history that I found to be interesting. Chicxulub Crater is one that's always peaked my curiosity, but I'd never had an actual sense of where on earth the event happened. Now with easy access to satellite photographs and their locations pinned to a map of the globe, its surprisingly simple to "go and visit" these sites in a way that we never could before. (And reminds me to be grateful that people have built this technology and provided access to it. Thank you!!)
The Chicxulub Crater buried under the Yucatan Peninsula in Mexico is what remains of a meteor impact strike that's been linked to extinction of the dinosaurs and numerous species from the time dating before roughly 65 million years ago. The crater is named after the town it's centered near: Chicxulub. The diameter of the crater is more than 180 kilometers, which makes it one of the largest confirmed impact sites on the planet.
For me an interesting feature of this is that you can't easily see evidence of the event by simply looking at a picture or even the site from space given that its largely under sea and probably the role that erosion has played in the ensuing years (many, many, many years.) It's only upon deeper investigation and connecting the dots of data that people have been able to tell the story of what happened here. We humans are easily distracted by noise and short-view thinking, but sometimes the mysteries of the world and our past only reveal themselves when you can tune out the noise and apply discipline and rigor to your efforts. This place is just one example reminding me to step back and observe more, and often when I do I'm amazed--and in this case, terrified.
Enjoy!