Fried Egg structure

The Fried Egg is an informal name for an underwater geomorphic structure that is a suspected impact crater. This structure, which lies at a depth of 2 kilometres (1.2 mi), consists of a 300 meters (980 ft) high and 3 kilometres (1.9 mi) in diameter circular dome that lies within a 110 meters (360 ft) deep, 6 kilometres (3.7 mi) in diameter, and roughly circular depression. It is this morphology on which its informal name is based. It lies about 150 kilometres (93 mi) from the Azores archipelago. Images that accompany newspaper articles show the presence of a well-defined rim that surrounds the roughly circular depression. These images also show a smaller roughly circular depression, which also contains a central peak, lies adjacent to the Fried Egg structure.

This structure is less than 17 million years old as constrained by the age of the ocean floor of which it is a part. Based on its morphology and the absence of any obvious lava flows that can be seen in the multibeam echosounder bathymetric data, it is hypothesized that this structure is a possible oceanic impact crater.

In news articles, it was reported that the Fried Egg structure was first identified using data acquired during a 2008 multibeam echosounder hydrographic survey. It presence was confirmed during a research cruise during September to November of 2009. In addition, it was reported that gravity and magnetic data were also acquired during the September 2009 research cruise and that a third expedition using remotely operated underwater vehicles to gather samples from this structure was planned.