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A new zircon-dating study suggests the buried Ames impact structure in northwestern Oklahoma formed about 370 million years ago—not around 467–470 million years ago, as previously believed. The result supports a Late Devonian age, but the authors describe it as the best current constraint, not a definitive timestamp for the impact.
Which crater is being redated?
The finding concerns the Ames impact structure beneath the town of Ames in Major County, northwestern Oklahoma. Its outer rim is about 14–16 kilometres across, according to the 2026 study. The structure lies beneath roughly 9,000 feet of sediment; the Oklahoma Geological Survey says it was recognized in 1991 after seismic exploration revealed a roughly circular feature around 10 miles across. The study describes Ames as a complex crater with a central uplift. The Oklahoma Geological Survey overview gives an approximate 470-million-year age, reflecting the older interpretation.
What changed in the age estimate?
For decades, scientists assigned Ames a Late Ordovician age based largely on conodont fossils found in material associated with the crater fill. The 2026 authors argue that those fossils could be older than the impact: impact-related disruption and mixing may have redeposited conodont teeth from pre-existing rocks. In that case, the fossils date the material they came from, not the formation of the crater.
Instead, the researchers analyzed zircon from impact-melt material using two U–Pb dating methods: secondary ion mass spectrometry and laser-ablation inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry. The youngest zircon population has a weighted mean age of 369.7 ± 5.9 million years, calculated from 10 of 11 analyses after one statistical outlier was excluded. The authors interpret this as the best current maximum-age constraint on impact-related zircon recrystallization and say it favors a Late Devonian age. The University of Texas at Austin summary reports lead author Elizabeth Catlos saying, “No matter what technique we used, it was coming back to this younger signal.”
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What the zircon dates—and what they do not
The age distinction matters: the study also reports a zircon emplacement age of 1,401.2 ± 8.1 million years for the granodiorite struck by the impact. That is the age of the target rock, not the crater. The younger zircon population is evidence the authors use to constrain impact-related recrystallization; it is not presented as an uncontested, exact date for the moment of impact.
Imaging showed primary oscillatory zoning and no deformation in most of the analyzed zircons, including the youngest Devonian-age grains. Two crystals had textures the paper identifies as impact-related. The authors note that suitable samples are limited and say more zircon dates and other material are needed to link the dated population more directly to the impact event. The result therefore revises the leading interpretation without closing the question.
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Why “nearly 100 million years later” is a fair comparison
The UT Austin account places the former age of the Ordovician Meteor Event at about 467.5 million years. Comparing that rounded reference with the youngest zircon population’s central value of 369.7 million years gives a difference of about 98 million years—hence “nearly 100 million years.” The comparison is between the old age assignment and the new study’s age constraint, not two equally certain impact timestamps.
If the Late Devonian interpretation is borne out, Ames no longer belongs in the cluster of North American impacts associated with the Ordovician Meteor Event. The authors instead place its youngest zircon dates near the Frasnian–Famennian boundary, an extinction interval around 372 million years ago. That timing is an association, not evidence that the Ames impact caused the extinction. The study notes that explanations for extinction events can include terrestrial processes such as volcanism as well as extraterrestrial impacts.
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Why Ames matters beyond its age
Ames is also known as a major oil- and gas-producing impact structure. That economic significance is separate from the dating argument: it does not establish when the impact occurred. In a statement carried by UT Austin, co-author Danny Stockli said, “These small crystals allow us to go back in time and learn about the major changes to Earth’s ancient landscapes.” He also called for dating more impact sites across the continent to build a more accurate chronology.
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