Silverpit crater the Chicxulub impact near the northwest corner of the Yucatan Peninsula, which occurred 66 million years ago and probably played a major role in the extinction of the dinosaurs. Several other large impact craters of around the same age have been discovered, all between latitudes 20°N and 70°N, leading to the speculative hypothesis that the Chicxulub impact may have been only one of several impacts that happened all at the same time. The collision of Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 with Jupiter in 1994 proved that gravitational interactions can fragment a comet, giving rise to many impacts over a period of a
Carolyn S. Shoemaker Carolyn S. Shoemaker Carolyn Jean Spellmann Shoemaker (born June 24, 1929) is an American astronomer and is a co-discoverer of Comet Shoemaker–Levy 9. She once held the record for most comets discovered by an individual. Carolyn Jean Spellmann was born in Gallup, New Mexico, United States. to Leonard and Hazel Arthur Spellmann. Her family moved to Chico, California, where she and her brother Richard grew up. Carolyn Spellmann earned bachelor's and master's degrees in history, political science, and English literature from Chico State University. Richard went to the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), where he earned a bachelor's degree in