AMMAN - A group of local and international scientists have discovered a huge crater in the eastern part of the country caused by a gigantic meteorite, thought to be the largest such find in the region.

The impact site in Jabal Waqf es Swwan, some 200 kilometres east of the Karak Governorate close to the Saudi border, was discovered by University of Jordan geology professors Elias Salameh and Hani Khoury, along with German professor Werner Schneider.

According to Salameh, the meteorite struck the area around 7,500-10,000 years ago with an impact diameter of about 100 metres.

"The damage force of such an impact might equal 5,000 times that of the Hiroshima atomic bomb," according to Salameh, adding that it would have destroyed everything within a radius of hundreds of kilometres.

The crater consists of two concentric circles. The diameter of the outer ring measures around 5.5km, with the inner ring measuring 2.7km.

The impact size and velocity, according to Salameh, would have raised the atmospheric temperature within a radius of 10 kilometres to more than one thousand degrees centigrade, spewing millions of tonnes of rocks, vapour, dust and smoke into the atmosphere.

This in turn would have formed an atmospheric cloud so large as to plunge the entire earth into darkness, with continuous rain for months or even years, resulting in the widespread flooding of low lands, according to a statement by the University of Jordan.

The discovery is thought to be the largest such meteorite crater in the region.

Future research at the site, which has been well-preserved due to the area's dry climate, will be supported by the University of Jordan and the Higher Council for Science and Technology.

Highlighting the importance of the find, Salameh said the site is expected to explain many geologic and historic features and events such as calcinated rocks, molten rock, highly jointed and cracked rocks.

There are around 130 crater structures of impact origin in the world. One of the oldest and largest clearly visible sites is the Vredefort Dome, located in South Africa.

The original crater, now eroded, was probably 250 to 300 kilometres in diameter, larger than the Sudbury impact structure in Canada, about 200km in diameter.

At two billion years old, Vredefort is far older than the Chixculub structure in Mexico which, with an age of 65 million years, is the site of the impact that is said to have led to the extinction of the dinosaurs.

All relevant institutions in Jordan have been informed about the discovery, including the Badia Project, the Department of Lands and Survey and the Natural Resources Authority, in order to take the necessary steps to conserve the site.