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Hypothermania says:
DaveF says:
March 27, 2013 at 5:46 am
So what killed those dinosaurs that lived in the sea?
Burning trees caused CO2 levels to increase, which caused sea levels to rise dramatically and they all died from vertigo.
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CodeTech says:
They also show that the mass of soot that could have been released from the impact site itself is far too small to account for the observed soot in the K-Pg layer.
Sure. The models show that. However, what other possibilities exist?
First, look at the current understanding of the Chicxulub impactor. It appears to have been about 6 miles in diameter, and left visible rings at 40 miles and 110 miles in diameter. An exceptionally thick layer at 4200 feet deep was part of the discovery, and there is displaced material that indicates a “kilometers high” tsunami, which is to be expected from such a powerful impact. Imagine that volume of water washing away in all directions, and be glad that nothing like this has happened recently. It seems likely that any combustible forest for a long way away would have been stripped bare and carried away.
Second, consider the incredible energy that has just been expended on the crust, sending ringing shock-waves around the planet like a bell had been rung. Any weak spot would soon be volcanic, and who’s to say just how much of the mantle was exposed? Was the crater a gaping, smoking hole for years afterward? We’ve seen just how much material is ejected from a single volcano (Pinatubo comes to mind, and Mt. St. Helens), just multiply that by an unknown but large number. The entire planet was likely blanketed by soot and ash as a direct result, and possibly for decades.
Third, we’ve now seen the Chelyabinsk event, recorded on video from multiple angles. That was a very high relative speed event, and I didn’t see any evidence of ground structures bursting into flames. Ejecta from the Chicxulub impact that cleared the atmosphere and came crashing back would not have the same kind of relative speed, thus less chance of igniting the forests (which were probably washed away).
I like playing “imagine if” games as much as anyone, but the conclusions I’m reading here seem like they’re all on the outside of probability. Nothing seems to take away the most likely current theory, that the extinction event was caused by dramatic and rapid cooling caused by the impact itself, not giant forest fires. Although I don’t doubt there were fires from the impact, and it’s nice that they measured all the soot.
One thing IS certain… we can theorize and hypothesize and imagine all we want, but NOBODY knows for sure exactly what happens when an impact of that magnitude occurs. And if we’re lucky, we never will.