Highway to Hell Creek; the discovery of the remnants of Jurassic park
In this dazzling rehash, author Steve Brusatte tells the mesmerizing story of dinosaurs; their origins, evolution, diversity, habitats and their cataclysmic extinction. This is a captivating narrative that engages the reader till the end of the book. Highly readable and well researched that interest readers focused in ancient history this planet, dinosaurs, and life in late cretaceous era (100 – 66 million Years). The book describes immediate events after planet was hit by 6.5-mile-long asteroid (Chicxulub meteorite), at the speed of 67,000 miles per hour, 65.5 million years ago. The fossils from this event are preserved all over the planet, which gives a grim picture. It simply demonstrates that life on earth is susceptible to the wrath of nature. This was the sixth extinction of life in 4.5 billion history of the planet, and it was colossal, cosmic and catastrophic. How did life witness this? The author describes in detail as what may have happened immediately before and after the greatest hit in the recent history of our planet. Although this has been discussed on several TV shows on Nat Geo, Discovery, PBS and Science channels by geophysicists, astronomers and paleontologists, it is interesting to read from the point of a paleontologist who studies dinosaurs with passion. In fact, it is common in recent days to read about the discovery of new species of dinosaurs, birds and mammals from this event. One of the goldmines for finding the lost species is Hell Creek, Montana where treasure trove of fossils is preserved. It is a mixing of fossil carcasses and a layer of glass tektites from meteorite hit with impact impressions deposited minutes to hours after the apocalypse.
The Hell Creek Formation in the Upper Great Plains of Montana, North Dakota and South Dakota were laid down by ancient rivers and streams as they traveled from the Rocky Mountains in the west toward the east before emptying into a large interior seaway that bisected North America during the latest Cretaceous period. Due to rise in sea-level in the Late Cretaceous, North America was bisected by a seaway stretching from the Arctic to the Gulf of Mexico. The states of NM, AZ, CO, SD, ND and MT were buried under water in a shallow sea that ran from Mexico to NW Canada. At that time the states of CA, OR, WA and ID were on the West and the rest of United States were on the east. The Hell Creek rocks preserve the remains of dinosaurs after Chicxulub meteorite struck into the ocean in the Yucatan Peninsula of Mexico. The death and destruction of the most iconic dinosaurs include Tyrannosaurus Rex, the three horned dinosaur, Triceratops, the duckbilled dinosaur, Edmontosaurus, and the tank-like armored dinosaur, Ankylosaurus. The fossils also include; crocodiles, lizards, snakes, turtles, frogs, salamanders, fishes, plants and mammals.
At this time, the planet was largely one supercontinent called Pangea, but it had started to split into several fragments. Europe and Asia were still globed together, and they were linked to North America by a series of islands. But what made these animals to become big? They had to eat and digest vast quantities of food, they had to grow fast, must be able to breathe very efficiently, and shed excess body heat. This process was enabled by their unique body plan that included a highly efficient lung more related to a birdlike lung because many bones of the chest cavity had big openings. There were many air sacs that extended throughout their body that helped lungs to take in enough oxygen to stoke their metabolism.
During the final 20 million years of the Cretaceous, tyrannosaurs flourished, ruling the river valleys, lakeshores, flood plains, forests, and deserts of North America and China. Colossal tyrannosaurs never seemed to gain a foothold in Europe or the southern continents, where other groups of large predators prospered, but in North America and China, species of tyrannosaurs were unrivaled. They had become the transcendent terrors that fire our imaginations. The species of Tyrannosaurus Rex was not a global but existed only in North West of United States.
On that fateful morning 66 million years ago, when a pack of T. Rexes woke up on what would go down as the final day of the Cretaceous Period, all seemed normal in their Hell Creek kingdom, the same as it had for two millions of years. Forests of conifers and ginkgoes stretched to the horizon, interspersed with palms and magnolias. The distant churn of a river, rushing eastward to empty into the great seaway that lapped against western North America. For the last several weeks, the more perceptive of the T. Rexes may have noticed a glowing orb in the sky, far off in the distance and a hazy ball also had a fiery rim. The orb would appear and disappear for hours. As it appeared again, it was bigger, its shine illuminating much of the sky to the southeast in a cloudy psychedelic mist. Then a flash. No noise, only a split-second flare of yellow that lit up the whole sky, disorienting the animals for a moment. As they blinked their eyes back to focus, they noticed that the orb was now gone. Moments later, and then they were blindsided. Another flash, but this one far more vengeful. The rays lit the morning air in a fireworks display and burned into their retinas. In fact, no noise at all. By now, the birds and flying raptors had stopped chirping, and silence hung over Hell Creek. The calm lasted for only a few seconds. Next, the ground beneath their feet started to rumble and shake, and then flew like waves; pulses of energy were shooting through the rocks and soil, the ground rising and falling as if a giant snake were slithering underneath. Everything not rooted into the dirt was thrown upward; then it crashed down, and then up and down again, the Earth's surface was acting like a trampoline. Everything within a radius of about six hundred miles from the Yucatan Peninsula of modern-day Mexico was annihilated, and vaporized. For several years, the Earth turned cold and dark because of soot, sulfur, sulfuric acid and rock dust in the atmosphere that blocked out the sun. The darkness brought severe winter for years that only the hardiest of animals could survive. The rains were highly acidic that wiped out much of marine species. Here and there, species of lizards, crocodiles, turtles, birds and rat-size mammals made it but with lots of duress under the fury of nature. Hell-Creek was turned to Hell that reverberated in rest of the world.
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