Spring, the season when the dinosaurs won – Liberation

By studying the bones of fish that died on the day a giant asteroid collided with Earth and caused a mass extinction of species, researchers have established that the catastrophe occurred in the spring in the northern hemisphere. Reptiles were particularly vulnerable in the middle of the breeding season.

It’s hard to know exactly when a giant asteroid hit Earth, destabilizing the climate on a global scale and killing 75% of animal and plant species on our planet. Researchers at the University of Glasgow have done their best to determine the date and Concluded in 2013 The catastrophe occurred about 66,038,000 years ago, with a margin of error of 11,000 years. Not bad. And today, in addition, we know that it was spring.

“The timeline of impact and its consequences have been studied primarily at millennium scales, leaving the question of season unresolved.”Abstract The study was published this week in the journal nature. However, evidence of the state of nature can be found on the day the meteor pierced the sky. The asteroid itself fell in Chicxulub in Mexico, digging Huge impact hole. In the minutes following autumn, a tsunami formed and spilled over all the surrounding coasts, carrying trees, rocks, and the bodies of dead animals on the spot.

At that time, an arm of the sea sank on the North American continent. The …