Popular Science

How and When Did the Dinosaurs Die? | VOLCANO OR ASTEROID?

Dinosaurs thrived in the warm temperatures and mild weather of what we call the Mesozoic Era. But 66 million years ago, the world’s climate drastically changed. Earth became like a Zach Snyder film—much colder and darker. Plants died, food became scarce, and three-quarters of the creatures on Earth—including most of the dinosaurs—went extinct. We still…

Published

7 years ago

September 26, 2019

CYBER TECH TV

We still debate what caused this relatively sudden change in climate. Two popular theories are an asteroid strike and the eruption of a giant volcano.

Learn more:

for more Popular Science on YouTube ►►
—
Producer/Video by: Jason Lederman

Narrator: Jessica Boddy

Researcher: Jillian Mock

Cameras:
Canon EOS C100 –
Canon EOS 5D Mark III –

Additional equipment:
Canon EF50mm Lens –
Canon Zoom Lens EF24-105mm –
Sachtler Ace XL Tripod System –
Sennheiser EW100ENG G3 Camera Wireless Mic Kit –
Litepanels Astra E 1×1 Daylight LED Panel –
Lowepro Magnum 650 AW Shoulder Bag –
The North Face Base Camp Duffel –

Music: APM Music

Media: Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (2016) Warner Bros. Pictures, NASA, USGS, NOAA, US Department of Energy, Wikimedia Commons, Google Earth, Prelinger Archives

CC BY 1.0:

CC BY-NC-SA 2.0:

CC BY 3.0:

(background removed & blend mode applied)

CC BY-NC-SA 4.0:

CC BY-SA 4.0:
(white_background).jpg (background removed & blend mode applied, also included in thumbnail)
—
GET MORE POPULAR SCIENCE

E-mail newsletter:

Flipboard:

Podcasts:

#dinosaurs #chicxulub #asteroid #volcano #trex

Related Topics:featured tech technology

Up Next

A more perfect unit: The New Mole || EXPERIMENTALS: Moles (part 2)

Don't Miss

Survive on a single food | CAN IT BE DONE?

17 Comments

Jack Jammen

September 26, 2019 at 7:20 pm

Will we be able to ever say roughly how much methane the dinosaurs put into the atmosphere?

Reply
- srdavis37
  
  September 29, 2019 at 11:18 pm
  
  No. Of course not. We can’t even guesstimate how many dinosaurs there were. Remember, we only know of the dinos whose bones fell in just the right spot under just the right conditions to become fossils. There may have been entire branches of species that we haven’t discovered yet – or never will.
  
  Reply
- Jack Jammen
  
  October 1, 2019 at 5:27 pm
  
  srdavis37 How about layers of sediment, that shows the atmospheric conditions of their end times?
  
  Reply
BnORailFan

September 27, 2019 at 12:51 am

We’re all paranoid of a killer asteroid impacting the earth in the near future but we probably wouldn’t be here now if one did in fact impact the earth 66 million years ago.

Reply
nickrich56

September 27, 2019 at 6:41 am

I guess out of these 2 choices volcanic activity is the best bet since big space rocks are far away and volcanoes are close.????

Reply
Adam Jenssen

September 27, 2019 at 8:34 am

The answer is very plain and simple. <—— This is how they died, and this is when they died.

Reply
Purbita Saha

September 27, 2019 at 3:17 pm

Birds are dinosaurs!

Reply
- JayD 05
  
  September 28, 2019 at 7:19 am
  
  Thank you for saying that
  
  Reply
Þorsteinn Sigurðsson

September 27, 2019 at 6:49 pm

it is called loss of atmosphere!!! geniuses! 😉

Reply
JayD 05

September 28, 2019 at 7:20 am

Dinosaurs never died out yo ever heard of birds

Reply
- JayD 05
  
  September 30, 2019 at 2:03 am
  
  No that’s just a translation of words Plus that guy you’re talking about he said all that stuff over 100 years ago when everyone thought they were big lizards now more than 100 years after that we have more knowledge of these amazing *not terrible*animals
  
  Reply
- MGTOWHub Project
  
  September 30, 2019 at 2:24 am
  
  @JayD 05 Yes, we all know the purple-green cuddly Barney. I think we may get lucky again and get some more Dino soft tissue that did not mineralize after 65 million years by some miracle and that can be sequenced. We do have some full DNA sequences of some birds. I predict that when compared, the idea that avians are dinosaurs would be laid to rest. The most likely case is that there is a remote common ancestry, but that is all.
  
  Reply
- JayD 05
  
  September 30, 2019 at 2:31 am
  
  Too bad we will most likely never get dinosaur DNA because DNA doesn’t last that long so with all the evidence we have now Points to birds being dinosaurs
  
  Reply
- MGTOWHub Project
  
  September 30, 2019 at 3:07 am
  
  @JayD 05 Well, collagen from T Rex soft tissue says “tastes like chicken”, because that seemed to be closest. However, no one compared it with extant reptiles. Maybe “tastes like gator” would be closer.
  
  Reply
- JayD 05
  
  September 30, 2019 at 1:18 pm
  
  Yeah but there’s no evidence of that so far what fits best with all of this is that birds are dinosaurs maybe one day will find some dinosaur DNA that is not broken that much and we will finally see whos right here
  
  Reply
Robert Flinn

September 28, 2019 at 9:10 pm

The 2 camera effect, with the speaker looking at the other camera, is distracting and not needed, and is annoying.

Reply
Richard Hopkins

October 25, 2019 at 9:07 am

Like you said, that meteor was 6 miles across.. The Earth is 8 THOUSAND miles across. It would take 1, 300 of those meteors to span the entire diameter of earth. If the Earth was the size of a basketball, that meteor would be about half the size of a grain of rice. That space rock was tiny Compared to Earth, and it wiped out like half the planet. Let that sink in for a minute

Reply

Popular Science

The Radioactive “Miracle Water” That Killed Its Believers

If you lived in the 1920s, you might have found a pamphlet advertising “the greatest therapeutic force known to mankind.” Radithor was a tiny bottle of clear, colorless water that claimed to cure acne, anemia, heart disease, poison ivy, impotence, asthma, and any other malady you could imagine. There was only one side effect: DEATH.…

Published

7 days ago

March 27, 2026

CYBER TECH TV

There was only one side effect: DEATH.

So, why did 1920s Americans go gaga for radioactive water? Well, it’s complicated.

Host: Annie Colbert
Reported by: April White
Editing and graphics by Avital Oehler
Written and produced by Matt Silverman

Popular Science

What’s Really Underneath This Massive, Noisy Siberian Crater?

In a remote area of the Siberian tundra, there’s a place that locals call ‘The Gateway to Hell.’ In the summer, its peaceful waterfall sounds are interrupted by the booms and crashes of falling earth. And while it‘s not actually a portal to another dimension, the Batagay Crater (technically a “megaslump”) is an unsettling mark…

Published

2 weeks ago

March 20, 2026

CYBER TECH TV

And while it‘s not actually a portal to another dimension, the Batagay Crater (technically a “megaslump”) is an unsettling mark of our changing world.