Change one quantity
Keep two settings fixed while changing the third to make a fair comparison.
Crater Creator
Compare illustrative craters while changing relative impactor diameter, speed and ground angle.
Grades 3–5 · Physics
Your goal
Test diameter 1, speed 2, and angle 90° above the ground. Compare the illustrative crater with the baseline impact.
Reduced motion is on. The controls still update the scene.
Adjust the impactor, then test one impact. The pale outline marks a diameter 1, speed 1, vertical baseline.
°
This illustrative model uses relative energy proportional to diameter cubed times speed squared. A sine squared angle factor and cube root crater rule provide a comparison, not a real crater prediction. Rock strength, gravity, atmosphere and impact physics are omitted. Impactor size, trajectory length, and crater cross section use independent scales. Do not use this activity to assess an impact hazard.
Related resources
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Learn with Crater Creator
Crater Creator helps elementary students compare impacts without treating a classroom illustration as a real hazard prediction. Set the impactor’s relative diameter, speed, and angle above the ground, then test an impact. Compare the resulting cross section with a fixed baseline and read the relative kinetic energy. Changing one setting at a time reveals how equal density connects diameter to mass and how speed affects energy. A deliberately simple angle and crater rule makes comparisons visible while the activity explains that real crater formation requires much more information.
What to look for
Compare energy
At equal density, doubling diameter multiplies mass by eight; doubling speed multiplies energy by four.
Check the baseline
The pale outline represents diameter one, speed one and a vertical impact.
For teachers and curious learners
Relate impact energy to mass and speed while recognizing the limits of a simplified crater model. Ask students to predict what will happen, change one setting, and explain what they observe. Learn gives a starting point. Practice and Challenge offer new goals with the same scene.
An illustrative relative energy model uses diameter cubed, speed squared, a sine squared angle factor and a cube root crater rule. It omits actual crater mechanics, materials, gravity and atmosphere and is not suitable for impact hazard prediction.