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101 Ways To Kill The Dinosaurs

Posted by timothy on from the russian-roulette-writ-large dept.

blank writes "Everyone knows there are many impact craters on Earth; around 170 in fact. This article from the Seattle PI points out that more than one of those impacts could have caused the extinction of the Dinosaurs. In Ukraine, scientists found that a well-known crater had been inaccurately dated - the correct date puts the impact sometime around when the Dinosaurs disappeared..."

1 of 48 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Catastrophism vs. Gradualism by fluffy666 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Events at the KT boundary:

    1: Long term climate change, over 10 million years or so; a fairly gradual cooling with changes in sea level. Makes the dinosaurs less energy efficient.

    2: Medium term, repeated massive volcanic events in the Deccan Traps. These would cause repeated climatic fluctuations; again this is bad for the big animals.

    3: Short term, one or more asteroid collisions causing a very severe short term climatic shock.

    It's worth pointing out that if you have any one of these in isolation - which has happened many times - you do NOT get an extinction on the KT scale. Personally I go for the 'It was everything at once what diddit' theory.