2024-08-20 16:09:37
It was one of the most devastating natural disasters in the history of our planet. 66 million years ago, a huge asteroid struck the area of present-day Central America, causing the mass extinction of the dinosaurs.
Now scientists want to have figured out, that the monster rock was hurtling towards us from the direction of Jupiter.
The gas giant, which is also the largest planet in our solar system, could have sent the asteroid directly towards us with its immense forces!
The Chicxulub crater is located in this area in northeastern Mexico
The impact site is located in the northern part of the Yucatán Peninsula in Mexico, bearing the name Chicxulub crater and having a diameter of about 180 kilometers. The asteroid impact with a diameter of 14 kilometers sent acidic dust particles into the air, which weakened sunlight, darkened the sky, and cooled the Earth by nearly 30 degrees for decades. As a result of this climate change, 70 percent of all animals and plants on Earth perished—including the dinosaurs.
The deadly dust particles spread all over the Earth. Now, researchers examined remnants of them in Denmark. And found the rare chemical element ruthenium in them. This is essentially a “genetic fingerprint” of rocks that are located in the asteroid belt between Jupiter and Mars, explains Mario Fischer-Gödde, a scientist at the Institute of Geology and Mineralogy at the University of Cologne.
The asteroid was either pushed out of its orbit by colliding with another celestial body or it was directed towards Earth by the enormous tidal forces of the gas giant Jupiter.
Researchers found and examined particles that spread on Earth after the asteroid impact
“One must understand the origin of objects like this if one wants to assess future dangers accurately,” says David Kring, senior scientist at the Lunar and Planetary Institute in Texas, who also studied the impact crater.
The Artemis program will study asteroids from the Moon
An important part of this in the coming years will certainly also be NASA’s Artemis program. This program aims to bring rock samples from the Moon to Earth. These samples come from asteroids or comets that bombarded our planet and its satellite at the beginning of their history.
And these should also provide insights into how such catastrophes can occur and how ideally they can be predicted or even prevented.