> Dang! I was just about to post this > one for you.

Thanks, but between bin Laden's latest attack and hearing news last evening of an acquaintance's death in a construction accident, I didn't get much sleep last night - I wish you had gotten to this first.

> Makes you wonder about all those
> "fire and destruction from the gods"
> incidents.

It does make you wonder. See my commentary on Guterbock's translation of "The Song of Ullikummi" in the Cambrdige Conference archives.

> Obviously, a vast majority of impacts > in the ancient world would have taken > place at sea,

About 7 out of 10, leading to to mega-tsunamis which killed shoreline populations.

> or someplace sparsely inhabited

Usually the areas hit were indeed sparsely inhabited, afterwards.

(so no one would ever know about them),

No one around to tell, except those on the periphery of the impact area - and though those people did try to tell people what happened, in recent times very few have believed them.

> so that a few in inhabited areas would signify a higher rate of actual impacts that are unseen (like seeing one cockroach).

When these things hit, the impacts are so large that they are noticed. Human records go back to about 3,000 BCE.

EP
http://www.geocities.com/epgrondine