Temporary polar reversal 42,000 years ago was catastrophic
Previously polar reversals were considered mild events in geologic history. New research accurately dates the temporary reversal 42,000 years ago was devastating.
Source: Upheaval and extinctions linked to magnetic reversal 42,000 years ago | EarthSky.org
Upheaval and extinctions linked to magnetic reversal 42,000 years ago
Posted by Kelly Whitt in EARTH | HUMAN WORLD
A magnetic reversal 42,000 years ago helped bring about earthly extinctions, scientists said, accompanied by changes in the sky including electrical storms and widespread auroras. “It would have been scary,” they commented.
A new international study suggests that a magnetic field reversal – combined with changing solar winds – contributed to an environmental crisis and mass extinctions 42,000 years ago. It happened around the time of the demise of the Neanderthals, an extinct human species that once roamed what’s now Europe, these scientists said, and it would have come with electrical storms, widespread auroras and an influx of cosmic radiation. One of the researchers in the video above commented:
… it would have been incredibly scary.
The study’s authors have named this catastrophic time period the Adams Transitional Geomagnetic Event, or Adams Event, a reference to a trope created by Douglas Adams, author of the comedy science fiction series The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. Adams famously wrote that 42 was the answer to:life, the universe and everything.
The University of New South Wales (UNSW) Sydney, and the South Australian Museum co-led the study, which was published on February 19, 2021, in the peer-reviewed journal Science. As Chris Turney of UNSW – a study co-author – explained in a statement: Earth’s magnetic field dropped to only 0 to 6% strength during the Adams Event. We essentially had no magnetic field at all. Our cosmic radiation shield was totally gone.
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Previously polar reversals were considered mild events in geologic history. New research accurately dates the temporary reversal 42,000 years ago was devastating.
Source: Upheaval and extinctions linked to magnetic reversal 42,000 years ago | EarthSky.org
Upheaval and extinctions linked to magnetic reversal 42,000 years ago
Posted by Kelly Whitt in EARTH | HUMAN WORLD
A magnetic reversal 42,000 years ago helped bring about earthly extinctions, scientists said, accompanied by changes in the sky including electrical storms and widespread auroras. “It would have been scary,” they commented.
A new international study suggests that a magnetic field reversal – combined with changing solar winds – contributed to an environmental crisis and mass extinctions 42,000 years ago. It happened around the time of the demise of the Neanderthals, an extinct human species that once roamed what’s now Europe, these scientists said, and it would have come with electrical storms, widespread auroras and an influx of cosmic radiation. One of the researchers in the video above commented:
… it would have been incredibly scary.
The study’s authors have named this catastrophic time period the Adams Transitional Geomagnetic Event, or Adams Event, a reference to a trope created by Douglas Adams, author of the comedy science fiction series The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. Adams famously wrote that 42 was the answer to:life, the universe and everything.
The University of New South Wales (UNSW) Sydney, and the South Australian Museum co-led the study, which was published on February 19, 2021, in the peer-reviewed journal Science. As Chris Turney of UNSW – a study co-author – explained in a statement: Earth’s magnetic field dropped to only 0 to 6% strength during the Adams Event. We essentially had no magnetic field at all. Our cosmic radiation shield was totally gone.
© Copyright Original Source