Lonar Lake: A Cosmic Scar & Wonder

Connections & celebrations
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An AI generated representation of the lonar lake

Lonar Lake is a unique saline soda lake located in the Buldhana district of Maharashtra, India. It’s globally significant because it was formed by a high-velocity meteorite impact, making it one of the very few hyper-velocity impact craters in basaltic rock.

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There are many other such lakes/craters made due to meteorite impacts but none like this

Almost a mile in diameter :downwards_button:

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When I tried with measurement tool it appears somewhere around ~1.6km in diameter :downwards_button:

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Approximately 52,000 ± 6,000 years ago (during the Pleistocene epoch).
Though some new studies date it back to even some ~580000 years, A meteorite, weighing about 2 million tonnes and traveling at around 90,000 km/hr, struck the Earth’s surface, creating a crater around 1.8 km in diameter and 150 meters deep. If you look at the satellite view and the measurement the width of the crater is reducing maybe due to water evaporation and sand filling the edges shrinking the shores.

The intense heat and pressure melted and altered the basalt rock, creating unique geological features.

What’s so special about it ?

  1. Basaltic Impact Crater: It’s one of the only known impact craters formed in basalt rock, as most are formed in granite or sedimentary rocks. There 4 Basaltic craters the other 3 are in brazil

  2. Alkaline and Saline Water: The lake has both alkaline (pH ~10.5) and saline properties, creating a unique ecosystem.
    Imagine having 2 different pH water in the same lake which dont get mixed and harbour different microbial life

  3. Microbial Life: The lake hosts extremophile microorganisms that thrive in high salinity and alkalinity, similar to conditions found on Mars.

  4. Magnetic Anomalies: Studies have found unusual magnetic properties in the rocks around the crater, suggesting significant geological changes from the impact.

  • IIT Mumbai studies found out that the samples from here matches with the samples brought back by Apollo Moon mission.
  • The flora here is non native and different than locally found flora.
  • Microorganisms activity is very interesting here. Lots of nitrogen fixing microorganisms.

Current Situation

Water Quality: The lake’s water quality has been deteriorating due to pollution and human interference.

Ecological Concerns: Algal blooms have been observed, and in June 2020, the lake’s water turned pink due to the growth of the salt-loving microorganism Haloarchaea.

Conservation Efforts: The Maharashtra government and environmental groups have taken steps to reduce pollution and preserve the lake’s ecosystem. It was also proposed to be included in UNESCO WORLD HERITAGE

  • It was declared Ramsar Site in 2020 which a type of protection for wetlands.
  • It is a notified National Geo-heritage Monument.
  • It has many religious temples around it.
    Wiki Link of Lonar Lake

Other Similar Impact Crater Lakes

  1. Meteor Crater (Arizona, USA): A well-preserved crater in sedimentary rock, about 50,000 years old.

  2. Ries Crater (Germany): Formed about 14 million years ago in sedimentary rock.

  3. Chicxulub Crater (Mexico): Caused by the asteroid impact linked to the extinction of dinosaurs (~66 million years ago).

  4. Aouelloul Crater (Mauritania): A smaller impact crater in basaltic rock (~3.1 million years old).

Lonar Lake stands out because of its formation in basaltic rock and the presence of both saline and alkaline water, making it a rare and valuable site for geological and astrobiological research.

This article was covered in 2021 in Marathi Language by an LG @C_T and lots of people interacted in comment section. Here is that post. Even one of our Indian Mod Mr @TusharSuradkar is from this area.
Link
Some more Posts you may find interesting :downwards_button:

:brown_square:Boha Glyphs The Largest ever geoglyphs
:green_square: Interesting Landscape found through Satellite

Did you find it interesting and never heard of the article before ?

Let me know in the comment section. And if you are history, geology buff mapper kindly follow and stay tuned for more such stories

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Dear @Trail_blazer ,
You have provided an interesting piece of crater lake . It’s so ,that’s because it is matter of cosmic event , only geographical scientists may prove its occurance from the time to time.
By the way , your hypothesis is a piece of praise worth .
Thanks .

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Wow, superb description @Trail_blazer . I have seen one in Iceland. Amazing place

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Thanks @Gurukrishnapriya iceland must be having many wonderful things like that. Great place of natural beauty and wonders.

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Its like miracle @Trail_blazer .
I visited this .

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Very true. I had a different experience.

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The photo of the Lonar Crater lake in the first photo looks fabulous @Trail_blazer
Did you click this photo?

Thank you for tagging me :slightly_smiling_face:
I lived very close to this place for 25 years - Aurangabad, now called Ch. Sambhajinagar.

As @Rushikesh_joshi says - this place is a miracle.

If you did not visit this place, please delete the post, or else it will be reported as spam.
Connect is a place for sharing our own experiences at a place.

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@TusharSuradkar If that’s the case, then I’m speechless. Many people, including myself, have shared satellite and map screenshots to provide information, answer queries, or highlight places for visiting purposes. Do you really need to physically visit a POI to write a paragraph about it on Connect?

People frequently use Google Maps and its icons in Meet discussions, which is technically against policy. I’ve already clarified that the image is AI-generated, not a real photo. Did you visit this place ? :fearful:

Also, let’s be consistent—many posts exist where users discuss places they haven’t personally visited but provide useful insights. If policy enforcement is selective, that’s a different concern altogether.
The first comment itself is an advertising spam lying untouched,unflagged and unquoted but I’m sad that you find my post irrelevant :eyes:

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OK. I missed the AI-generated part in the image.
Sharing AI-generated images are fine on Connect, if relevant to the post @Manishhh

But Connect is primarily a platform for local guides to share their own experiences.

Providing general knowledge available elsewhere on the internet is not encouraged.
Rest, you decide what to share.

Regarding, your other examples and citations, please share the links to such posts, I will check and flag them as spam or irrelevant to Connect. The final decision is with Google.

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Thanks man @TusharSuradkar I appreciate your response. A lot of the times there isn’t much encouraging here just bunch of newbies posting same old questions or just sharing random snap shot. I don’t know what to do with that. Mods don’t show up for days it’s people like us who jumps to help. I remember reading when connect moved to New Connect that lots of content is unorganised and irrelevant.
I try to keep things a bit different though interesting. I still believe there is no better place to discuss such geographical wonders than connect. I have some places in my bucket list and i didn’t google them I found some of them here in connect. Not a big deal for me if this post goes to trash but the only thing you will notice is “me” less often here on connect. There was time when virtual meet ups didn’t make sense and now that’s the only thing that’s happening. I can find thousands of videos related to photography but people wrote wikipedia size articles here on connect. Did that make sense ? They may not be directly related but I guess they help the people here. Anyways peace out :+1:t2:

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Please don’t think that the mods are the only ones who can moderate the community.
@Manishhh

Every local guide can do this - especially in the new connect where flagging a post to the moderators is now accessible for every local guide.

Also, moderation involves encouraging those who are silent and shy + also discouraging those who are aggressive and noisy = spammers.
Together = that is MODERATion

I was doing such kind of moderation even when I was not officially a moderator.
You are welcome too :handshake:

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Well I try my best to make quality stuff you can still go back to my articles and could notice they are different than the most people and necessarily not aimed to get any attention or likes coz even if I have thousands of them I’m going no where with those. There are certain highlighted POI where most people go and write same mundane articles about them. I try to do bit different than others. I can slate 12 meet each year and run 10 articles every month and needless to say my single add place flicks 500k in few months. And post about celebrating a b c d day every week but I don’t do that. Isn’t it a spam ?
I went to few places last month I will run posts about them and it be one of the common post as usual. But I still try to make them catchy and unique. I agree with most of the stuff you said. But it’s just that I would mostly avoid posting if such is the case. Peace out :folded_hands:t2:

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@Trail_blazer this is unique by the way the first picture is stunning. :clap:t2:

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Hello dear friend @Trail_blazer, It’s amazing to know such stunning places exist, I’m so pleased to see such an interesting and unique post on Connect. I like the photo#1 the most. It’s a beautiful spot.

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Thanks dear @PrasadVR and @MathanVibranarayan if you can fund me 1 lac or more I can have the drone n get a shot like that for sure :winking_face_with_tongue: my skills will speak the quality and coverage :rofl:

Read carefully it’s an AI generated photo. I hope you guys already aware of AI prowess these days they can do wonders with text and image.

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