What is known about the asteroid that killed the dinosaurs?
Source:asteroid Impact was the cause of the chain of dramatic events
Despite the extreme weather situation in which the world today, we are incredibly lucky to live in XXI century and not in the era of the Cretaceous period. It was then, 65 million years ago, our planet was hit by a giant asteroid, whose impact is comparable to the impact of a million atomic bombs. Not surprisingly, the consequences were disastrous. In 2010, the journal published the work of an international team of researchers, who for 20 years has studied possible causes of the mass extinction of those years. Scientists came to the conclusion that the asteroid impact triggered a series of chain reactions that led to disaster. Today, the number has increased significantly. But what scientists know about this asteroid?
Asteroids — the reason for mass extinctions
For none of us it is no secret that the mass does not happen overnight — it is a long process that can take millennia. Although every day we are bombarded by small rocks from the solar system that fall into the atmosphere, our planet has asteroids is very small or is not large enough to cause any significant damage. However, scientists clear that sooner or later, a similar disaster will happen again.
If a celestial body with a diameter of 15 kilometers will collide with the Earth, then in a matter of seconds to destroy a few kilometers of the surface. Such a strike could provoke tides and form a cloud of dust that will cover the Sun for tens or hundreds of years. Can you imagine such a scenario? But 65 million years ago experienced all these effects for yourself. According to experts, if today our planet will hit like an asteroid, the impact formed a crater with a diameter of 200 kilometers, and there will also be a series of events that will cause a global winter that could destroy most of life on Earth in a matter of days. In addition, the asteroid impact could cause tsunamis and earthquakes.
Theory of volcanoes
For many years, some scientists continued to believe that dinosaurs, pterosaurs and other species 65 million years ago a series of volcanic eruptions in modern India, which lasted around 1.5 million years. The eruption of Deccan traps (unusually active volcanoes) threw a sufficient number of basaltic lava twice to fill the Black sea that could cause global cooling of the atmosphere and acid rain.
Researchers believe that the asteroid could have triggered volcanic eruptions cause acid rain
And yet this hypothesis must not conflict with the fall of an asteroid. Thus, the study of scientists from the University of California, at the beginning of 2019 shows how the impact of an asteroid can cause both volcanic eruptions on the other side of the world (Mexico and India are almost opposite to each other). According to available data, marine and land ecosystems were destroyed rapidly in the Cretaceous Paleogene extinction, which was not the theory of volcanoes. But there is also compelling evidence that gases emitted during eruptions after blow could be the cause of global warming in the last 400 thousand years of the Cretaceous period. By the way, recently we told you about why the asteroid that could destroy our civilization is not as easy as we thought.
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