The extinction of the dinosaurs was a tragic event on Earth

As few people do, American Riley Black tells in his latest book what happened millions of years after the asteroid impact...

As few have done, the American Riley Black describes in his recent book what happened several million years after the asteroid impact: a time of extreme destruction, but also an amazing recovery of life on the planet.

No one knows for sure if it was Sunday afternoon, Monday morning, or Friday morning.But it happened.Suddenly, on a spring day 66 million years ago, debris left over from the formation of our solar system hit the planet, on Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula.And he unleashed hell on Earth.

What was a simple guess in the 1980s is today the strongest hypothesis - with the most accumulated evidence - that explains the disappearance of 75% of plant and animal species living at that time, including all non-avian dinosaurs.

"As far as we know, most of the big dinosaurs, including Tyrannosaurus Rex and Triceratops, died within the first 24 hours," says American science journalist Riley Black for SINC, who in her book, The Last Days of the Dinosaurs: Asteroid, Extinction, and the Beginning of a New World (published by Captain Swing, explores a few years after Weeks in the World)."If this sidereal stone hadn't collapsed and without the further destruction it caused," he adds, "we wouldn't exist."

We tend to think of this asteroid that crashed into Earth 66 million years ago as the great executor of the dinosaurs.Shaber in your book believes that we are grateful that such a disaster happened?

Extinction where 75% of species disappear quickly is not a good day for anyone.But yes, it was the most tragic day in the history of life on Earth, followed by tens of thousands of years of struggle for survival.The death of the dinosaurs was just the tip of the iceberg.Extinction has affected almost all ecosystems.If non-avian dinosaurs had survived, I wouldn't be around or be able to tell their stories.

What distinguishes this mass extinction from the four major extinctions that preceded it?

Since the 1970s, paleontologists have recognized five major mass extinctions.The asteroid extinction at the end of the Cretaceous period was the fifth.The previous four were all caused by terrestrial causes, such as changes in oxygen levels in the oceans.Or massive volcanic eruptions that released so much methane and carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases for so long that the oxygen content of the atmosphere changed and the oceans got bored

The Cretaceous extinction was not a mass extinction that took place over hundreds of thousands of years or millions of years.This great extinction occurred 66 million years ago when an 11 km asteroid hit the planet in what is now the Yucatan Peninsula with an explosive force 10 billion times greater than the atomic bombs dropped at the end of World War II.

The mass extinction was not a mass extinction that occurred over hundreds of thousands of years or millions of years.

The devastation occurred between the first 24 hours and the following three years.It really was like the blink of an eye.It fundamentally changed the planet.It's sad that we lost all the non-avian dinosaurs.And yet, there is no moral or value judgment in that.It is a reminder that, on our planet, we are still part of the solar system, the galaxy, the universe.And unexpected things like this can happen.

Cover ng 'The Last Days of the Dinosaurs'./ Captain Swing Editorial

But it's not just an asteroid strike, is it?

There have been many asteroid impacts on Earth.The Popigai crater in Siberia dates back 37 million years, but the asteroid that created it did not cause a global mass extinction.The asteroid that caused the Chicxulub crater on the Yucatan Peninsula, on the other hand, collided with such force and pulverized so much rock that all those tiny pieces were thrown into the atmosphere and began to rain all over the planet.It also raised global temperatures, which alone caused deforestation.enough to catch fire.And that was just the first day.

And what happened after that?

For three years after the impact there was a global winter.Sunlight did not reach the planet in sufficient quantities and photosynthesis more or less stopped for most plants.In the oceans, plankton shrank as they received less light and the foundations of the marine ecosystem were destroyed.In other words, the mass extinction was not caused by a simple single event, such as an asteroid impact, but by the cascade of events it caused.

In the ocean, plankton has declined because there is less light and the foundations of the marine ecosystem have been destroyed.

So what caused the large dinosaurs to disappear so quickly?

The air temperature far exceeded what any animal could withstand.It was the deadliest day in the history of the planet.Smaller dinosaurs, including birds, could be found underground.The earth is an excellent insulator.Even if some large dinosaurs survived, there were fires, earthquakes, tsunamis, volcanic eruptions and the sky became covered with soot.The birds survived because the seeds were edible.

After the fifth mass extinction, the world had never seen animals as large and as prolific as non-avian dinosaurs./ Prehistoric Planet / Apple TV Press

The book is a love letter to dinosaurs, but also an ode to the resilience of life.Why did you decide to focus on the downfall of these "terrible lizards"?

As a scientist, I wrote years to complete our financial year.of mammals, but the period is not as frequent as that damage, paleocene, and life style recovery.

In your book, you combine scientific evidence with anecdotal evidence, as well as your personal history.How did you think about explaining what happened from the point of view of dinosaurs and the remains of the species that suffered as a result of the disaster?

It was a risk.I recognized what I thought about dinosaurs when I was a child, or I learned why many of us go to see a new film from the Jurassic World saga almost every summer: because we want to see these animals alive, to imagine them breathing and walking.Thanks to the latest research, we know more and more what they looked like, how they behaved, and what color some of them would have been.Instead of quoting scientists, I wanted to speak directly to readers who love these animals as much as I do.

Even today, children know about the impact of the asteroid that wiped out the dinosaurs.However, this is a relatively new hypothesis: it was proposed by Luis Álvarez and Walter Álvarez in 1980, and in 1991 a 200 km wide crater was discovered in the Yucatán Peninsula.Which surprised you the most?

Until the 1980s, no one knew what happened to the dinosaurs, and no one knew for sure.Geologists George and Roberta Poinar have suggested that early cats were very active in destroying plants and eating surviving dinosaurs.Everyone has their pet theories.

In the early 20th century, many paleontologists approached the extinction of the dinosaurs as if it were not a problem worth researching:

At the beginning of the 20th century, many paleontologists approached the extinction of the dinosaurs as not even a problem worth studying: they saw them as large, strange, and uninteresting, and assumed that mammals were somehow superior.

Most of the large animals, such as dinosaurs and pterosaurs, died within a day of an asteroid impact 66 million years ago./Apple TV Press

What are the main unsolved mysteries or mysteries surrounding this event?

I think the biggest puzzle is how this mass extinction played out in the rest of the world outside of western North America.What we actually know is from a relatively limited area of ​​Late Cretaceous and Early Paleogene rocks preserved in states such as Montana, Colorado, and the Dakotas in the United States.We are just beginning to see what happened in South America and other parts of the planet.It was a world phenomenon, and we can be sure that the story was the same all over the world.

Do you think there is anything relevant to the current climate emergency that can be learned from this mass extinction event?

It is a warning about the fragility of life and a reminder that eventually everything, sooner or later, dies.But the great extinction also speaks of the extraordinary durability of life: the survivors lay the foundation not only for our ancestors, but for the world that surrounds us today.Those 25% of the species that managed to persist began to evolve and transform in new and unexpected ways.

Extinction is neither a sad nor a happy event;it is part of the workings of life and evolution.

Extinction is neither a sad nor a happy event;It is part of the business of life and evolution.It reveals how adaptable and resilient life can be: even in the worst-case scenarios, something manages to survive and continue.In the turbulent twenty-first century, this idea resonated deeply with me.In times when it is easy to feel helpless, it is important to maintain some form of hope.

This book is also very personal.How does it relate to your life story?

I finished my last book and ended my thirteen year marriage.After the divorce, I came out as transgender and started my transition.Broadly speaking, I felt like the world I knew had suddenly collapsed;I felt like a wreck.

Losing a relationship is terrible, and I wasn't who I really was.Still, I had a deep hope for the future: how I could change and become the person I could be.I guess that explains why this story appealed to me.For me, it reminded me that loss is not the end.It's there and it's important, but a lot can grow after that.

Why do we love dinosaurs so much?

It's a constant question.There are many wonders of prehistoric organisms.We don't cry for the trilobites that disappeared at the end of the Permian or for the jawless fish that almost disappeared in the Devonian.Sometimes I wish they had a little more attention.The usual answer is that dinosaurs fascinate us because they are big and brave, but we don't fear them because they are extinct.

Also, the act of imagining a dinosaur is equivalent to bringing the dead to life.I remember watching them with interest as a child and trying to imagine what they would be like.I didn't have a particularly safe childhood.However, the dinosaurs were my friends, my protectors.

Also, the dinosaurs were real animals that we created a story about.We developed an almost intimate relationship.These can be multifaceted creatures: our friends, research subjects, terrifying monsters, and, like us, organisms that are a succession of happy and comfortable situations.