Topic: Dinosaur asteroid hit 'worst possible place' (Read 750 times)

Yes, heard of that before. The asteroid didn't directly cause much of the damage, save for the areas near impact. What it did definitely was exacerbate the existing problems. I didn't remember this basalt thingie but I remember it was said that there was a change in the climate which caused plants to fail, which then spread to the rest of the system.

I believe most of the dinosaurs wouldn have still died off without the impact, specifically the larger carnivores. The crash hastened the  collapse though and also left little time for them to adapt.

none the less, I think an asteroid that big would probably wipe out most of the living things on earth. imagine how high the taunamis would get and how far inland it would go if a rock that big landed in our deepest oceans. though some dinosaurs would probably have survived but still that would cause worldwide extinction

That was a nice discovery and I do hope to watch the documentary film on that one. This evidence will now give additional evidence that the dinosaur were killed and became extinct because of the asteroid that hit the earth. But there are more things to discover about the history of this planet and as man walks on this planet they will learn more things that will help them develop and at the same time protect this planet.

Even without all the sulphur that wen't into the atmosphere this asteroid impact was still severe enough to cause a long nuclear winter. The dinosaurs, especially the biggest kinds of them were a species with great needs. They would have never managed to adapt to the new environment. It was just their time to go.

 The way I understand it, flood basalt eruptions combined with drastic reductions in seal level had already caused a large decline in plant and animal populations of the Cretaceous period.  The asteroid impact was likely a blessing in disguise - accelerating the extinction event that was already underway.  Maybe it was "best" for all involved and all yet to be... provided that the plants and animals of that period were capable of paired comparison analysis. 

Besides, the Caribbean is a fun place. And it wouldn't be like it is if the meteor hadn't crashed there.

Wow, even asteroids go to Mexico to die. Did they crack there? No offense Mexicans.

Anyway, this is interesting. I've always though the winter was just mainly due to all the dust ejected into the atmosphere. We really learn something new everyday. This reminded me of a TV series I saw, I believe it's called Big History. So many what-ifs.


True. It's only worst from a dinosaur's point of view and they're not around now to whine anyway that the impact mostly affected them and so it was speciest. 

Prior to this, mammals were mostly shrew-like animals. Without the extinction event, mammals could have not found any vacant niche to occupy.

The "worst" is subjective here. Extinction of then dominant species provided plenty room for further devolpment of life on Earth. Mammals that inherited Earth have by nature significantly larger brain to body mass ratio, than lizards.

And well, here we are. So it wasnt "worst" from my point of view.

I hope that the attempted cover-up will be rendered impossible by private Internet news groups, when they start bringing up pieces of the gigantic spacecraft. Of course, probably one of the best methods for space travel over large distances is by hollowed-out meteor.

Scientists who drilled into the impact crater associated with the demise of the dinosaurs summarise their findings so far in a BBC Two documentary on Monday.

The researchers recovered rocks from under the Gulf of Mexico that were hit by an asteroid 66 million years ago.

The nature of this material records the details of the event.

It is becoming clear that the 15km-wide asteroid could not have hit a worse place on Earth.
The shallow sea covering the target site meant colossal volumes of sulphur (from the mineral gypsum) were injected into the atmosphere, extending the "global winter" period that followed the immediate firestorm.

Had the asteroid struck a different location, the outcome might have been very different.

"This is where we get to the great irony of the story – because in the end it wasn’t the size of the asteroid, the scale of blast, or even its global reach that made dinosaurs extinct – it was where the impact happened," said Ben Garrod, who presents The Day The Dinosaurs Died with Alice Roberts.
Image copyright BARCROFT PRODUCTIONS/BBC
Image caption The fractured rocks were subjected to immense pressures

"Had the asteroid struck a few moments earlier or later, rather than hitting shallow coastal waters it might have hit deep ocean.

"An impact in the nearby Atlantic or Pacific oceans would have meant much less vaporised rock – including the deadly gypsum. The cloud would have been less dense and sunlight could still have reached the planet’s surface, meaning what happened next might have been avoided.

"In this cold, dark world food ran out of the oceans within a week and shortly after on land. With nothing to eat anywhere on the planet, the mighty dinosaurs stood little chance of survival."
 

Ben Garrod spent time on the drill rig that was stationed 30km off Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula in April/May last year, to better understand the aims of the project; Alice Roberts visited widely separated fossil beds in the Americas, to get a sense of how life was upended by the impact.

Rock cores from up to 1,300m beneath the Gulf were recovered.

The lowest sections of this material come from a feature within the crater called the peak ring.

This is made from rock that has been heavily fractured and altered by immense pressures.

By analysing its properties, the drill project team - led by Profs Jo Morgan and Sean Gulick - hope to reconstruct how the impact proceeded and the environmental changes it brought about.


http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-39922998