About 66 million years ago, the Cretaceous period ended with the extinction of three-quarters of animals and plants, including dinosaurs. The mass extinction event was the result of an impact event by an asteroid that created the 180 kilometre wide Chicxulub crater in Gulf of Mexico.
It has been theorized that when the asteroid hit the material that filled the crater, was created by the impact with water flowing into the crater. But, the details about the material and the rate at which the crater filled was unknown. According to the research published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, almost 425 feet of material was deposited on the first day. The research paper is titled, ‘The First Day of Cenozoic’ and as the name suggests, it explores everything that happened one day after the impact event which started the Cenozoic period.
The researchers from University of Texas, Austin performed analysis of rocks from the crater ring by using drill aboard the Myrtle Lifeboat. The data suggests that on impact, the rocks flew out, creating a ring protrusion around the crater. The water flowing into the crater carried more melted rocks with it and then a tsunami hit. The wave that was created by the impact came back towards the crater carrying with it sediments of sand, charcoal and gravel. The impact triggered wildfires which were then doused by the waves of the tsunami and the burnt charcoal was carried to the crater.
The rocks from the asteroid contained sulfur which was vaporized and released to create sulfate aerosol haze. Evidence of the same has been previously found by geologists but, this time around, the data reinforces the fact that it played a role in the extinction event. The impact did cause devastation in the locality of the impact but the global extinction took place due to the climate change caused by the release of massive volumes of sulphur, almost 325 billion metric tonnes.
This caused the climate to cool down in the following years which led to the giant animal species that lived at the time. It also affected photosynthesis in plants and plankton that led to drastic reduction in their population.
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