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+--- Thread: Volcanic activity convicted in Permian extinction (/thread-1293.html)
Volcanic activity convicted in Permian extinction - C C - Aug 28, 2015
https://www.sciencenews.org/article/volcanic-activity-convicted-permian-extinction
EXCERPT: The biggest catastrophe in the history of life on Earth resulted from one of the most titanic volcanic outpourings on record, new research concludes. At the close of the Permian period around 252 million years ago, more than 90 percent of all marine species and roughly 75 percent of all land species vanished. New high-precision analysis of ancient lavas determines this extinction followed the start of massive volcanic eruptions in what is now Siberia [...] The finding clinches what paleontologists have long suspected: Volcanic gases prompted environmental changes that made the planet uninhabitable for most life.
The researchers have “found the smoking gun for this extinction event,” says geoscientist Richard Ernst of Carleton University in Ottawa. The Siberian Traps eruptions spewed more than 3 million cubic kilometers of molten rock, enough to bury the United States to the height of the Eiffel Tower. Scientists knew this volcanism took place around the time of the Permian extinction but couldn’t determine whether the Siberian eruptions were the cause of the die-off or just a coincidence....