Space asteroid caused a huge crater in the North Sea

Have you ever heard of the Silverpit Crater?

It's an a hole in the Earth under the North Sea, around 80 miles (128 km) off the Yorkshire coast of Hull and Scarborough, and was discovered in 2002.

For the last 20 years geologists have debated what caused it and they now say they have the answer - an asteroid!

Scientists say more than 43 million years ago, a 535ft (160m) wide asteroid fell to Earth, leaving a 1.9 mile (3km) wide dent which is buried under the seabed.

This is a very exciting discovery, as craters like this are very rare.

Dr Uisdean Nicholson, associate professor at Edinburgh's Heriot-Watt University, says there are "around 200 confirmed impact craters exist on land and only about 33 have been identified beneath the ocean".

As the Silverpit Crater lies under the current seabed, it is not visible and so special scanning equipment was used to map it.

Until now, one theory was that it had been caused by salt particle movements, or the collapse of the seabed due to volcanic activity.

But the new study, using seismic imaging, has shown it was most likely caused by the asteroid landing in the North Sea.

At the time this would have caused a huge tsunami, a destructive wave.

The Silverpit Crater is located around 80 miles (128 km) off the East Yorkshire coast

Dr Uisdean Nicholson said it was thanks to new technology that they had been able to solve the mystery of the crater's origins.

He said the research team, funded by the Natural Environment Research Council, had recovered rare "shocked" quartz samples which settled the argument.

"We were exceptionally lucky to find these, a real needle-in-a-haystack effort." he added.

"These prove the impact crater hypothesis beyond doubt, because they have a fabric that can only be created by extreme shock pressures."