72 thousand tons of diamonds in the walls of houses. This is the only place like this in the world

Nördlingen lies in the center of a crater 26 kilometers in diameter. This is the result of the impact of a huge asteroid that collided with the Earth's surface 15 million years ago at a speed of about 25 kilometers per second. The force of this collision was so great that the rocks were subjected to extreme pressure and temperature. Inside them, millions of tiny diamonds were created from microscopic carbon bubbles, none of which exceeds 0.2 millimeters in width.

The resulting rock, known as suevite, became Nördlingen's primary building material. For centuries, the inhabitants were not aware of its extraordinary wealth - the diamonds, although numerous, were too small to use them or even notice them with the naked eye.

Just enter one of the historic buildings to see how unique this place is. Stone stairs of the Gothic tower of the church of St. George shine in the sun's rays, casting unexpected flashes of light on the walls. It is in the suevite from which the tower was built that millions of tiny diamonds are hidden. If they were larger, the tower would probably not survive to this day - it would have been dismantled by treasure hunters long ago.

According to geologists' estimates, there are approximately 72,000 tons of diamonds in the walls and buildings of Nördlingen. This is a concentration of these precious stones found nowhere else in the world. Although suevite can also be found in other places, nowhere has it been used on such a scale to build a city.

For hundreds of years, the inhabitants of Nördlingen were convinced that their city was founded in the crater of an extinct volcano. It was only in the 1960s that American geologists - Eugene Shoemaker and Edward Chao - decided to verify this theory. After careful examination of the landscape, they concluded that the crater was not of volcanic origin, but was caused by an asteroid impact.

The breakthrough discovery changed not only textbooks, but also the perception of the city by its inhabitants. It turned out that they walk the streets every day and live in houses whose foundations hide priceless treasures created as a result of a cosmic catastrophe.

Today, Nördlingen attracts not only tourists, but also scientists from all over the world. In the local RiesKrater museum, located in a historic barn from the 16th century, you can see meteorites, fragments of Suevite and memorabilia from the Apollo mission. It was here, before their expeditions to the Moon, that the Apollo 14 and Apollo 16 astronauts trained, learning to recognize rocks similar to those they would encounter on the Silver Globe.

Geologists and researchers from NASA and the European Space Agency regularly visit Nördlingen to delve into its extraordinary past and investigate the effects of the asteroid impact.