>>About 65 million years ago, a huge asteroid slammed into the Earth and wiped out three quarters of all life. The most famous victims were the dinosaurs, but many others, including marine life, were devastated too. And now, researchers from Yale have found evidence of just what happened in the oceans – the waters became too acidic for many animals to take.

The asteroid impact wasn’t the instant Armageddon it’s often portrayed as. Sure, anything unlucky enough to be too close to ground zero would have been killed pretty quickly, but life elsewhere on the planet would have succumbed to the onslaught of natural disasters that followed. These effects may have lingered for years afterwards.<<

>>“The ocean acidification we observe could easily have been the trigger for mass extinction in the marine realm,” says Pincelli Hull, senior author of the study.

According to the team, the evidence indicates that as much as half of the life in the ocean vanished fairly quickly. After that followed a long period of slow recovery.<<

https://newatlas.com/science/dinosaur-killing-asteroid-ocean-acidification/

PermeateFree said:

>>About 65 million years ago, a huge asteroid slammed into the Earth and wiped out three quarters of all life. The most famous victims were the dinosaurs, but many others, including marine life, were devastated too. And now, researchers from Yale have found evidence of just what happened in the oceans – the waters became too acidic for many animals to take.

The asteroid impact wasn’t the instant Armageddon it’s often portrayed as. Sure, anything unlucky enough to be too close to ground zero would have been killed pretty quickly, but life elsewhere on the planet would have succumbed to the onslaught of natural disasters that followed. These effects may have lingered for years afterwards.<<

>>“The ocean acidification we observe could easily have been the trigger for mass extinction in the marine realm,” says Pincelli Hull, senior author of the study.

According to the team, the evidence indicates that as much as half of the life in the ocean vanished fairly quickly. After that followed a long period of slow recovery.<<

https://newatlas.com/science/dinosaur-killing-asteroid-ocean-acidification/

Yes and no.

The asteroid generated SO2 in huge quantities, which is a deadly poison to everything that breathes air. This includes fish and crustaceans. But excludes, to a large degree, hibernating mammals, amphibians and reptiles.

As a secondary effect, the SO2 acidified the oceans.

mollwollfumble said:

PermeateFree said:

>>About 65 million years ago, a huge asteroid slammed into the Earth and wiped out three quarters of all life. The most famous victims were the dinosaurs, but many others, including marine life, were devastated too. And now, researchers from Yale have found evidence of just what happened in the oceans – the waters became too acidic for many animals to take.

The asteroid impact wasn’t the instant Armageddon it’s often portrayed as. Sure, anything unlucky enough to be too close to ground zero would have been killed pretty quickly, but life elsewhere on the planet would have succumbed to the onslaught of natural disasters that followed. These effects may have lingered for years afterwards.<<

>>“The ocean acidification we observe could easily have been the trigger for mass extinction in the marine realm,” says Pincelli Hull, senior author of the study.

According to the team, the evidence indicates that as much as half of the life in the ocean vanished fairly quickly. After that followed a long period of slow recovery.<<

https://newatlas.com/science/dinosaur-killing-asteroid-ocean-acidification/

Yes and no.

The asteroid generated SO2 in huge quantities, which is a deadly poison to everything that breathes air. This includes fish and crustaceans. But excludes, to a large degree, hibernating mammals, amphibians and reptiles.

As a secondary effect, the SO2 acidified the oceans.

Though that does bring up a couple of interesting questions.

1. How deep into the ocean was it acidified? I’m guessing less than 400 metres because deep ocean fish all survived.

2. What was the effect of the chicxulub asteroid on phytoplankton? Not obvious because the excess CO2 and extra iron added to the oceans is a positive for phytoplankton, the short term global cooling from fine aerosols is a negative, and I don’t know the effect of SO2 on phytoplankton.

3. What is the effect of SO2 on global warming? Anyone want to answer that?

We can take a holistic view of this:

Causes: Chicxulub & Deccan

Effects:

• Superheating atmosphere – Chicxulub only, not Deccan, deadly only to terrestrial species and marine reptiles, not marine fish.
• SO2 emission – both, most from Deccan – deadly to air breathers, including surface marine fish and ammonites. Not to hibernators. Some ocean acidification.
• CO2 emission – both, most from Deccan – safe for air breathers, long term heating. Some ocean acidification.
• Fine atmospheric aerosols – short term cooling. Deadly for tropical terrestrial species.

The SO2 by itself would explain all observed extinctions. The other three alone would not. So SO2 emission must have been the dominant extinction mechanism.

mollwollfumble said:

mollwollfumble said:

PermeateFree said:

>>About 65 million years ago, a huge asteroid slammed into the Earth and wiped out three quarters of all life. The most famous victims were the dinosaurs, but many others, including marine life, were devastated too. And now, researchers from Yale have found evidence of just what happened in the oceans – the waters became too acidic for many animals to take.

The asteroid impact wasn’t the instant Armageddon it’s often portrayed as. Sure, anything unlucky enough to be too close to ground zero would have been killed pretty quickly, but life elsewhere on the planet would have succumbed to the onslaught of natural disasters that followed. These effects may have lingered for years afterwards.<<

>>“The ocean acidification we observe could easily have been the trigger for mass extinction in the marine realm,” says Pincelli Hull, senior author of the study.

According to the team, the evidence indicates that as much as half of the life in the ocean vanished fairly quickly. After that followed a long period of slow recovery.<<

https://newatlas.com/science/dinosaur-killing-asteroid-ocean-acidification/

Yes and no.

The asteroid generated SO2 in huge quantities, which is a deadly poison to everything that breathes air. This includes fish and crustaceans. But excludes, to a large degree, hibernating mammals, amphibians and reptiles.

As a secondary effect, the SO2 acidified the oceans.

Though that does bring up a couple of interesting questions.

1. How deep into the ocean was it acidified? I’m guessing less than 400 metres because deep ocean fish all survived.

2. What was the effect of the chicxulub asteroid on phytoplankton? Not obvious because the excess CO2 and extra iron added to the oceans is a positive for phytoplankton, the short term global cooling from fine aerosols is a negative, and I don’t know the effect of SO2 on phytoplankton.

3. What is the effect of SO2 on global warming? Anyone want to answer that?

We can take a holistic view of this:

Causes: Chicxulub & Deccan

Effects:

• Superheating atmosphere – Chicxulub only, not Deccan, deadly only to terrestrial species and marine reptiles, not marine fish.
• SO2 emission – both, most from Deccan – deadly to air breathers, including surface marine fish and ammonites. Not to hibernators. Some ocean acidification.
• CO2 emission – both, most from Deccan – safe for air breathers, long term heating. Some ocean acidification.
• Fine atmospheric aerosols – short term cooling. Deadly for tropical terrestrial species.

The SO2 by itself would explain all observed extinctions. The other three alone would not. So SO2 emission must have been the dominant extinction mechanism.

Even so, it’s unfortunate that dinosaur eggs didn’t make it. Eggs have a low oxygen usage.