INTERPRETATION OF GEOPHYSICAL DATA OVER PANTHER MOUNTAIN CIRCULAR STRUCTURE

The Panther Mountain circular structure is located in the Catskill Mountains near the eastern edge of the Allegheny Plateau. It is a circular mountain mass, 10km in diameter and surrounded by a annular drainage pattern formed by Esopus Creek and its Tributary Woodland Creek. It is believed by the late Y.W. Isachsen that the feature is a meteorite crater. North-south and east west gravity profiles conducted across the mountain indicate a small gravity low over the mountain which would be consistent with low density breccia in the crater. Also support of the crater hypothesis is in the study of seventy five thin sections of quartz rich layers showing pressure deformation features (PDF) and black magnetic spherules, which suggest an impact origin.

In 2000, several universities loaned their exploration seismographs to conduct seismic reflection surveys. The seismic traverses were conducted along Little Peck Hollow Road in the southwestern area of the structure. The purpose of the survey was to image the area around the rim to determine if strata outside the rim was undisturbed while the structure inside the rim was disturbed.

The seismic survey indicated that a reflection inside the crater area shown on the Little Peck section also occurs on the Maben-Hill section outside the Panther Mt. region. This does not support the crater hypothesis however, more seismic surveys, to see if the reflector at .7s is disrupted in the crater, are needed.