A Meteor will Strike the Earth and Destroy All Life Forms Essay example

This researcher proposes that the dinosaurs did not die of heat, in fact she thinks the opposite, that they froze to death instead. Both articles have the same idea about a meteorite hitting the earth yet there is no concrete evidence as to what caused the meteorite to strike and what it did when it got here.

Large amounts of iridium – a chemical element that is not a part of the Earth’s crust composition – were originally found in rocks of Europe and United States, and have been found everywhere ever since. Iridium, common in meteorites, is a testable evidence of the disaster hypothesis. Gould continues that the Cretaceous debacle, which is one of five episodes of mass dying, occurred at the same time as the large comet might have smashed into the Earth. The author believes this is not merely a coincidence, rather, it is a proof of the cause-effect relationship. The demise of a wide range of habitats along with the extinction of dinosaurs gives an inestimable advantage to the disaster theory over other claims, the author adds. The comet struck the Earth, and habitats, from terrestrial to marine, died with geological suddenness. Finally, this hypothesis has had an impact on the study of an atomic war and its consequences. A nuclear war, Gould says, may cause a huge drop in temperatures and result in the extinction of humanity. Testable evidence, study, development, contribution – all this makes good science.

Although Martin is correct in his observation that humans have a direct impact on extinction, he cannot refute the fact that meteors can cause extinction. His argument in regards to dinosaur extinction was flawed. Martin argues that every child in the first grade knows that dinosaurs vanished 65 million years ago. However, there is no evidence that there were humans on this Earth when dinosaurs existed so his whole argument becomes null. He cites factual inaccuracies in this

The asteroid impact extinction theory began in 1980 with Luis and Walter Alvarez, a father and son team. They theorized that an asteroid struck the Earth at the close of the Cretaceous period, causing devastating effects and mass

It is difficult to envision that one of the greatest impact craters on Earth that measures up to 180km wide and 900m deep could just vanish just from sight. There have been many different dinosaur extinction theories offered in the recent decades. These range from poisonous plants to mass suicide by dinosaur herds. Although one concept as to how the dinosaurs became extinct has gained a wide acceptance since the 1980’s, involving a major earth impact by a meteor or comet (Icr.org, 2014). This horrific catastrophic event is thought to have extinguished up to two thirds of all animal and plant species, leaving behind a large crater found in Chicxulub, Mexico (LiveScience.com, 2014).

Impact craters are geologic structures formed when a large meteorite, asteroid or comet smashes in to a planet or a satellite. Meteorites are small rocks in space that hit the earth's atmosphere at a high velocity. Throughout their history they have heavily bombarded all the inner bodies in our solar system. In this experiment we will use marbles as our meteorites, these will be free falling objects that will be used to copy an asteroid impact. The surfaces of the Moon, Mars and Mercury, where other geologic processes stopped millions of years ago, record this bombardment clearly. On the Earth, however, which has been

Such an era came to a staggering end from the grand celestial meteoroid which assaulted life into

The author mentions that the oceans could all evaporate and the Earth probably couldn’t handle those conditions. This would lead to the release of hydrogen gases into outer space, losing a vital gas, and turning into our neighbor planet Venus. Although this is highly unlikely, many organisms cannot withstand such dramatic change over such a short time, the Earth would reach a point where only rats and cockroaches could survive in such conditions. Humans would even have a difficult time adapting as seen by the Mayans who died because of a minor setback on rain. The author believes that a lot of carbon will settle in the rock and be “a record, written in stone of a world changed by a single

There are many key events, but the most crucial incident came on July 15, 1994. Eugene Shoemaker, Carolyn Shoemaker, and David Levy had discovered a comet in March of 1993 that was on an impact path with Jupiter (Koppes). The comet, SL9(Shoemaker- Levy 9), consisted of 21 large lumps of ice that would cause more destructive force than thousands and thousands of 58-megaton bombs . From this event, witnesses from scientists to civilians with telescopes watched as the comet created brilliant flashes of light and left dark impact spots on Jupiter (Koppes). This incredible event led to the question, “what if we knew a comet like SL9 was headed towards earth?” In 1998, NASA started the NEO(near earth objects) Observations program to find and track asteroids that will come close to earth(Chodas). Today, this program has identified over 13,000 asteroids and comets that come close to earth. But let us put into perspective what is meant by close before we start preparing for the end of the world. Presently, the most recent “close call” was on June 16 when Asteroid Icarus passed by earth at a distance of over 50 million miles(Brown). That is over 21 times the distance from earth to the moon

Background Research: A meteoroid is a small chunk of rock that has been broken apart from a much larger chunk of rock called an asteroid, these chunks of rock are located in between Mars and Jupiter, called the asteroid belt. When a meteoroid has been knocked out of the asteroid belt and is on it way towards earth the meteoroid is now a meteor, if the the meteor hits the ground it changes to a meteorite. When the meteorite makes contact with the ground it causes a crater to form, craters are holes on the ground made by the impact of a meteoroid coming towards earth.

Also, in the book I finally understood that the asteroid itself didn’t kill off the dinosaurs, but it was the ash that was produced from the asteroid. The Earth is really a delicate planet, and slight changed have an effect on the environment. Humans have been effecting the planet for too long, and soon enough it’s going to change the Earth drastically. Our species have added approximately 365 billion tons of carbon dioxide from burning fossil fuels, and on top of that another 180 billion tons from deforestation. These numbers increase each year, and even with people starting to become environmental friendly and finding natural alternatives, there are last effects in the atmosphere, earth, and water. Coral reefs are effected everyday day buy pollution and rising temperatures in the oceans, and habitats are destroyed constantly to build

Although asteroids could destroy Earth if they come in contact with it, small meteors that

Armageddon was not created as a whimsical fantasy of Hollywood masterminds. In fact, its basic premise stems from a distinct historical event. In 1994, for the first time in the history of humankind, scientists were able to witness in detail the collision of two solar system bodies. Having circled Jupiter in an enclosing elliptical pattern for what scientists speculate to be hundreds of years, comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 was wrenched out of its orbit by Jupiter’s gravity and into a collision course with the planet’s dense atmosphere. This collision produced "bubble[s] of superheated gas that blazed with 50 times the infrared luminosity of the entire planet, briefly blinding some telescopes." Comet fragments pounded Jupiter at an estimated speed of 60 kilometers per second (134,000 miles an hour), and although the largest fragments measured no more

How exactly the asteroid damaged the Earth remains unclear, but the power released by such an impact is unquestionable. Effects possibly include reduced sunlight over a period of several months which possibly led to the decline or even total halt of primary production (via photosynthesis). One of the dominant signatures of the extinction at the KT boundary was the low activity of primary production, the possibility of reduced sunlight is high (Schulte et al. 2010) . Even if the primary production proved to be on a decline when this impact occurred, there is still some uncertainties as to where exactly the impact hit. This was why asymmetries in subsurface features of the Chicxulub crater were observed via geophysical methods were analyzed and it was calculated from estimates that the

This final blow would have sent earth into a nuclear winter. According to this theory, dust caused by the asteroid collision disrupted plant growth by blocking out the sunlight needed for photosynthesis for nearly a year. A chain reaction occurred as plants died off, so did the herbivores relying on the plants, and then the carnivores that relied on the herbivores. Around 75% of species became extinct, including dinosaurs, mammals, giant marine lizards, fish, birds, and insects. Meanwhile, seawater flooded around 40% of the world’s continents ("Mass Extinctions").