Second Impact

Adam's Wings of Light extending into the stratosphere over the South Pole, scattering disembodied souls

Second Impact is a global cataclysm which occurred on September 13th, 2000, when a massive explosion occurred in Antarctica which melted the polar cap and even altered Earth's axis. The explosion resulted in massive tsunamis, followed by a dramatic increase in global sea levels which flooded most coastal cities, and caused a catastrophic shift in global weather patterns.

According to the official report on the disaster by the United Nations, the massive explosion was the result of a meteorite impact. Hence the event was dubbed "Second Impact" (as opposed to the "First Impact", the theorized massive meteorite collision 4 billion years ago that created the Moon). The meteorite was supposedly too small to detect but was traveling at near the speed of light, resulting in it striking with tremendous force despite its size.

Two billion people the southern hemisphere were instantly killed by the gargantuan tsunamis which followed the explosion. Many more would die in world wide coastal flooding. As a result of the subsequent chaos, global wars soon broke out due to food and resource shortages and refugee crises. Two days after the disaster, a nuclear exchange broke out between India and Pakistan over refugee tensions. On September 20th, seven days after Second Impact, a nuclear bomb was dropped on Old Tokyo, killing half a million people. Fighting spread across the world, and only ended on February 14th, 2001 when the Valentine Treaty formally put an end to the fighting. By the end of these events, the global human population was halved.

Known only to a select few was that the meteorite impact story was simply a cover up: the true cause of Second Impact was when the First Angel, Adam, exploded as the result of a "Contact Experiment" carried out by the Katsuragi Expedition, which was itself secretly backed by the mysterious Seele organization.