Comment on Rogozin et al., (2023), Morphology of Lakes of the Central Tunguska Plateau (Krasnoyarsk krai, Evenkiya): New Data on the Problem of the Tunguska Event of 1908

Abstract

In a recent paper, Rogozin and coauthors present a morphologic/seismostratigraphic study of two small lakes, Lake Zapovednoye (LZ) and Lake Peyungda (LP), located 50‒60 km east from the alleged epicenter of the 1908 Tunguska Event (TE), a large explosion believed to have been caused by an extraterrestrial impact. Data presented in that paper suggest a similar (although not specified) origin of these two lakes and Lake Cheko, located close to the TE epicenter. This led Rogozin et al., to question the impact crater origin of Lake Cheko, whose depression was interpreted by Gasperini et al., as caused by the freefall of an extraterrestrial fragment, which survived an atmospheric explosion. We analyze Rogozin et al., data, focusing on similarities and differences between Lake Cheko, LZ and LP, to determine whether their findings are relevant to the TE problem.