Geologists at Curtin University have dated the North Pole Dome impact structure in Western Australia’s Pilbara region to 3.0 billion years ago, establishing it as the oldest known asteroid crater on Earth. The finding, published in the journal Geology, pushes the previous record-holder—the Yarrabubba crater, also in Western Australia—back by roughly 750 million years, into the Archean eon when the planet’s earliest continents were assembling and life existed only as microbial stromatolites. The asteroid is believed to have struck what was then a water world, leaving a rare deep-time capsule in rocks that largely escaped the recycling effects of plate tectonics.

The age was pinned down using two independent mineral clocks. Zircon crystals within the shocked basalt display unusual skeletal branching, interpreted as recrystallisation during the extreme heat of the impact; analysis with an Australian-designed Sensitive High-Resolution Ion MicroProbe returned an age of approximately 3 billion years. A second mineral, apatite, which grew in fractures from hot fluids mobilised by the strike, yielded the same date. Outside geochemists describe the concordance as a “smoking gun.” However, a US-based researcher from Harvard disputes the result, pointing to shatter cones in nearby rocks dated to 2.77 billion years and suggesting the zircons may record a later, non-impact hydrothermal episode. The debate remains open.

The confirmation arrives as skywatchers in the Northern Hemisphere prepare for the June Bootids meteor shower, active from 22 June to 2 July with a peak expected around 27 June. Originating from debris shed by comet 7P/Pons-Winnecke, the shower is notoriously erratic: the International Meteor Organisation notes that in most years it produces only one or two meteors per hour, but outbursts of 50–100 were recorded in 1998 and 2004. No outburst is forecast for 2026, though astronomers caution that the shower’s behaviour is inherently unpredictable. Viewing recommendations from astronomy platforms stress dark rural skies, a 20-minute adaptation period without phone screens, and avoiding telescopes to maintain a wide field of view.

For the Pilbara crater, the next research milestone will be constraining the size of the impactor and the original crater dimensions, though erosion and tectonic overprinting make this challenging. Further dating of the surrounding rock sequence may also clarify the dispute over the structure’s exact age. For the meteor shower, the immediate observational window is the coming nights, with no reliable activity forecast available.