Astrobleme

It came from outer space. This lovely word refers to the remains of a large ancient meteoric impact, a roughly circular scar of crushed and deformed bedrock, from half a mile to 40 miles (0.8 to 64 km) in diameter. It’s only in the last half century that these remnants have been identified for what they are, since most have been almost completely eroded away. The best way to identify one is through the cone of shattered rock that lies beneath it. The most famous is probably the Sudbury Astrobleme in Canada, whose mines supply about half the world’s nickel. Geologists may dispute the inclusion of this word in the Weird Words category, as it is a well-known term in geology, though it only dates only from the 1960s. But let's salute the person who invented it: showing a poetic streak not often associated with that most literally down-to-earth subject, it was coined from Greek astron, a star, plus blema, a wound. Star wound—what a romantic notion. Shall we never think of geologists as prosaic ever again.