Impact ejecta glass records atmospheric columnar disruption and strong E-field

Tektites are a naturally occurring form of cosmic impact ejecta, produced in ~ 2 or 3% of impact events from melted and mixed silicate sediments that are launched into space where they devolatilize and quench to solid glass.  Australasian tektites (AAT) make up the largest and most recent of the known tektite strewnfields, covering ~1/4 of Earth’s surface with 30 to 60 billion tons of melt glass.  In southeast Asia, the Indochinite sub-family of these glassy objects appear mainly as fractured and sometimes contorted fragments of formerly hollow spheroid predecessors.  Surface textures, bulk and detailed morphometrics of Indochinite fragment-form tektites record a tortured history that is not consistent with mere hypersonic atmospheric reentry into a standard atmospheric column.  The tektites show rapid bulk reheating and surface effects consistent with high-voltage arcing disruption.  The overall region where these fragment-form tektites fell has a surface that was laterized within hours of their arrival, pulsed with heat and moisture to the point of degrading the rocks and soil the tektites lie within.  Clear ablation signatures on symmetric ablated spheroid AAT of Australia and the Central Indian Ocean basin indicate their source as the N. American Great Lakes region.  The Marine Isotope Stage MIS20 epoch (deep ice age) of the event and Michigan Basin geology suggest several thousand cubic km of disrupted Laurentide Ice Sheet may have been injected across the exosphere via oblique ricochet impact, lingering as degenerate byproducts for a day or more.  High-potential E-field and regional disruption of the atmospheric column from exosphere to surface over southeast Asia is indicated.