# Question on the Chicxulub impact **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [September 13, 2018, 4:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-on-the-chicxulub-impact/821274 "2018-09-13T16:25:29Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![davidmich](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e56c9b/32.png) [@davidmich](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/davidmich)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2018, 4:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-on-the-chicxulub-impact/821274/1 "2018-09-13T16:25:29Z")
Hi How reliable is this theory which directly contradicts previous studies of global freezing following the Chicxulub impact? I look forward to your feedback. > **[Dino-Killing Asteroid Impact Warmed Earth's Climate for 100,000 Years](https://www.space.com/40690-dino-killing-asteroid-impact-warmed-earth.html)** > > Carbon dioxide released into the atmosphere after the impact of the Chicxulub asteroid, which ended the era of dinosaurs some 65 million years ago, warmed the Earth's climate for 100,000 years, a new Dino-Killing Asteroid Impact Warmed Earth’s Climate for 100,000 Years Carbon dioxide released into the atmosphere after the impact of the Chicxulub asteroid, which ended the era of dinosaurs some 65 million years ago, warmed the Earth’s climate for 100,000 years, a new study has revealed. > **[The Dino-Killing Asteroid Caused 2 Years of Frozen Darkness](https://www.inverse.com/article/35755-dinosaur-asteroid-aftermath-2-years-darkness)** > > It was a dark time to be alive. The Dino-Killing Asteroid Blotted Out the Sun for Two Years On Monday the moon passed directly between the sun and the Earth, sending towns in the path of totality into darkness for a maximum of two minutes. But 66 million years ago, after a great asteroid struck the world of the dinosaurs, the sun’s light was blotted out around the planet for an unbelievable two years. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2018, 4:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-on-the-chicxulub-impact/821274/2 "2018-09-13T16:34:37Z")
> [@davidmich](#): > > Hi > > How reliable is this theory which directly contradicts previous studies of global freezing following the Chicxulub impact? Did you read your own cite? _First_ there was freezing (possibly decades-long), \*then \*there was warming, for millennia. ---
**Author:** ![Great\_Antibob](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e47c2d/32.png) [@Great\_Antibob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Great_Antibob)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2018, 4:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-on-the-chicxulub-impact/821274/3 "2018-09-13T16:36:50Z")
So, the gist is (if I’m getting this right): There was a period of significantly less direct sunshine on earth (up to a few decades possibly) where temperatures plunged. Over the following 100,000 years (noting that 100,000 years is much, much longer than even a century), the average global temperature was apparently higher than before the impact presumably due to some kind of greenhouse effect. I think I’m missing something here because I’m not seeing the contradiction between these two ideas. ---
**Author:** ![davidmich](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e56c9b/32.png) [@davidmich](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/davidmich)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2018, 4:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-on-the-chicxulub-impact/821274/4 "2018-09-13T16:46:52Z")
Ok my mistake. Sorry. There is no contradiction. ---
**Author:** ![Sailboat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sailboat/32/461_2.png) [@Sailboat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sailboat)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2018, 5:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-on-the-chicxulub-impact/821274/5 "2018-09-13T17:16:00Z")
Note also that according to most thinking I’ve read on this subject, the “impact winter,” no matter how long it lasted or how severe it was, was _irrelevant_ to the extinction of nonavian dinosaurs and other large land animals. I frequently see conversations online in which someone suggests that the long sunless plant-killing cold would have starved the dinosaurs. Although there were nonavian dinosaurs living in the then-polar regions, acclimatized to the cooler weather there (it was not as cold as today) and used to long periods of darkness in winter, even they would not have survived a severe impact winter. But that’s irrelevant in this case, because the Chicxulub impactor probably killed every animal on the surface of the earth with shock and fire. The debris re-entering the atmosphere around the world is believed to have set the earth’s atmosphere on fire; surface temperatures are estimated to have been 1,500 degrees Fahrenheit. No animal, Jeff Goldblum included, could have found a way to survive that. The surviving animals were either under water or underground (in a test, temperatures were tolerable in tunnels 8 inches below a forest floor that was being incinerated at 1,500 degrees). The extinction affected more than the nonavian dinosaurs – a lot of sea life was lost – and _those_ animals probably were affected by the impact winter (and, according to this study, the following warming). But the dinosaurs we loved as children were gone by then. ---
**Author:** ![Banksiaman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/banksiaman/32/3334_2.png) [@Banksiaman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Banksiaman)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2018, 9:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-on-the-chicxulub-impact/821274/6 "2018-09-13T21:42:17Z")
> [@Sailboat](#): > > … But the dinosaurs we loved as children were gone by then. Jeff Goldblum most missed of all. We will never again see his magnificent kind, shaking the earth with every step, chewing the scenery … ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2018, 12:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-on-the-chicxulub-impact/821274/7 "2018-09-14T00:46:46Z")
You might also survive if you happened to be on or above the water, sufficiently far from the flammable stuff on the shores. Which is a big advantage to flying creatures, which is probably why all of the dinosaurs that survived were fliers. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2018, 12:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-on-the-chicxulub-impact/821274/8 "2018-09-14T00:52:18Z")
> [@Great\_Antibob](#): > > So, the gist is (if I’m getting this right): > > There was a period of significantly less direct sunshine on earth (up to a few decades possibly) where temperatures plunged. > > Over the following 100,000 years (noting that 100,000 years is much, much longer than even a century), the average global temperature was apparently higher than before the impact presumably due to some kind of greenhouse effect. > > I think I’m missing something here because I’m not seeing the contradiction between these two ideas. That’s what I see also. From the first linked article: > [@](#): > > Scientists have long theorized that after the piece of space rock with a diameter of 6 to 9 miles (7 to 14 kilometers) smashed into the Yucatan Peninsula near today’s town of Chicxulub in Mexico, the temperature of the planet first rose sharply for minutes or hours, MacLeod said. After that, it plunged down for months to decades, because the huge amount of dust and soot thrown into the atmosphere by the impact blocked the sun’s rays. Eventually, however, carbon dioxide released during the impact led to global warming. > > MacLeod’s study is the first to present empirical evidence of how long this greenhouse gas-related global warming lasted and how substantial it was. The research is on how long the expected warming after the cold lasted.