Uncovering the Tragic Tale of an Ancient Asteroid Impact
Archaeologists excavated Tell el-Hammam for a decade and a half. Their findings were examined by dozens of scientists in the US, Canada, and the Czech Republic. One thing that jumped out was a five-foot-thick layer from around 1650 BC, comprised of charcoal and ash, intermingled with melted metal, melted pottery, and melted bricks. There was also shocked quartz, generated at pressures of 725,000 psi or more, and diamonids, wood and plant particles turned tough as diamonds under great heat and pressure. It was evidence of an intense firestorm, but not one caused by ancient warfare, an earthquake, or volcano: they don’t generate enough heat to melt metal, pottery, or bricks. The only known culprits that could inflict such damage are nuclear blasts, and asteroid airbursts. Nuclear weapons were unknown 3650 years ago, so that narrowed it down.
It is believed that the explosion vaporized and deposited so much Dead Sea salt water in the area, that it became impossible to grow crops. For centuries after the disaster, Tell el-Hammam and its environs were abandoned. It took about 600 years before rainfall washed out enough salt to render the soil sufficiently productive for habitation to resume. Accounts of the ancient city’s obliteration became part of the local folklore and were handed down over the generations. A version of such folk accounts probably made it into the Old Testament as the story of Sodom and Gomorrah. Similarities about cities near the Dead Sea destroyed by fire and rocks from the sky make it likely that the biblical narrative can be traced to the air burst that wrecked Tell el-Hammam.
