The formation of chicxulub crater should be 65 million years ago, which is consistent with the Cretaceous-Tertiary extinction event. Physicist Luis Alvarezl and his son, geologist Luis W. Avarez believe that the main culprit of this extinction event is celestial impact.
The evidence is that there is a thin clay layer in the stratum corresponding to the global age. In the1970s, it was confirmed that the iridium content in the clay layer was as high as 6 ppb by weight. The iridium content in the whole stratum of the earth was only 0.4ppb, but meteorites may contain 470ppb. Dust clouds produced by meteorite impact are deposited all over the world, forming clay strata with extremely high iridium content.
Extended data
Relevant data of chicxulub crater:
The diameter of the impact object that caused the crater is estimated to be at least 65,438+00 km, and it completely evaporates after impact, releasing up to 4.0× 65,438+0023 Joules of energy, equivalent to 6,543,800+0 million tons of yellow explosives (9,546.5 million tons of TNT equivalent).
The strongest man-made explosive in human history is the czar hydrogen bomb, with an explosive power of only 50 million tons of yellow explosives; The energy of the Hixulub collision was 2 million times that of the czar's hydrogen bomb.
Scientists estimate that La Garita volcano in Colorado is the largest volcanic eruption in geological history, and its power is 1.0× 10.22 Joule (239 billion tons of TNT), which is far less than the Hicksulubo impact event. 65438+33 million years ago, the largest volcanic eruption in the history of the earth had an energy of only 2.3 trillion tons of TNT, and the Hiksulubo meteorite was even more powerful.
Baidu Encyclopedia-chicxulub crater