Prehistoric meteor shower? |
Prehistoric meteor shower? |
Dec 13 2007, 07:02 PM
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#1
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Member Group: Members Posts: 688 Joined: 20-April 05 From: Sweden Member No.: 273 |
A real weird news story from Nature about meteor damage to pleistocene fossils:
http://www.nature.com/news/2007/071212/ful...s.2007.372.html If traces of this meteor shower has been found in both Siberia and Alaska as the story implies, then multiple impactors must have been involved. Such small meterites would lose speed quickly so the airburst must have occurred at fairly low altitude. |
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Dec 16 2007, 12:47 PM
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#2
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Member Group: Members Posts: 117 Joined: 7-December 06 From: Sheffield UK Member No.: 1462 |
The idea that these animals were present and in the immediate vicinity when a meteorite hit the Earth is interesting. However, I find it quite unlikely.
To me, a much more plausible explanation is that our ancestors were hunting with meteorite material. All they had to do was find an iron meteorite, smash it into sharp shards and attach the shards to wooden poles to form an effective hunting spear. The meteorite material embedded in the tusks and bones would therefore simply mark the impact point of such a weopan. -------------------- It's a funny old world - A man's lucky if he gets out of it alive. - W.C. Fields.
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Dec 16 2007, 03:03 PM
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#3
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Member Group: Members Posts: 524 Joined: 24-November 04 From: Heraklion, GR. Member No.: 112 |
The meteorite material embedded in the tusks and bones would therefore simply mark the impact point of such a weopan. From the article : "Some of the tusks are peppered with hundreds of the fragments, which had burnt grooves into the bone. All the pieces entered the bones on the skyward surfaces of the tusks and skull." The quantity of the fragments, along with the fact that they burned the tusks on their way in suggests spears or arrows are not likely explanations. Unless prehistoric people made bullets out of meteorite fragments Edit : A lot more information in the poster from AGU. |
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