Meteor Crater Visitor Center

A museum on the rim of Meteor Crater, with the Holsinger meteorite, the largest piece of Canyon Diablo ever found.

Key facts

Where

near Winslow, Arizona, United States

Kind

Visitor site

Visiting

Open-air site or visitor centre

Meteor Crater, also called Barringer Crater, is a bowl about 1.2 kilometres across and 170 metres deep in the desert of northern Arizona, made about 50,000 years ago by the impact of an iron asteroid perhaps 50 metres across. It was the first crater on Earth to be accepted as made by an impact.

The visitor centre on the rim has viewing platforms and a museum about impacts. Its most famous exhibit is the Holsinger meteorite, a mass of about 639 kilograms and the largest single piece of the Canyon Diablo iron found around the crater. Visitors can touch it. Canyon Diablo is a IAB iron, and small pieces of it are among the most widely owned meteorites in the world.

Highlights

• Canyon Diablo the Holsinger mass, about 639 kg Iron, IAB-MG

Related pages

Opening times, what is on display and access to research collections change over time, so check with the institution before you visit.