The Permian Mass Extinction was the largest extinction event in Earth's history,
and it happened about 252 million years ago… give or take. Doesn't
ring any bells? It's the reason we're all here today, so it's kind of important.
Just as in the extinction event that wiped out the dinosaurs 65 million years ago,
many geologists believe a huge rock flying into the Earth may have caused the Permian extinction.
National Geographic reports that scientists have found rubble and craters from the right time
period in Australia, and that debris contains a very rare hunk of shocked quartz — which is
different from regular quartz on a microscopic level, and only forms during asteroid events.
These fragments have also been found in Antarctica, which was — at the time of the event
— in the same general area of the supercontinent Pangea as Australia. For an idea about just how
far-removed from our modern era this was, the landmass of Pangea was just starting to split up,
a world-changing event that The Geological Society says happened about 250 million years ago.
However, it's also believed that if an asteroid did in fact strike the Earth, it most likely
barreled into the ocean and kicked up the shocked quartz in the resulting watery explosion.
However, if this is the case, the event left us no underwater clues to observe today,
since Earth Archives notes that the ocean floor gets a tectonic makeover every 200 million years.
Scientists also think the big blue sea could have had a hand in this mass murder. How? Andrew Knoll,
a Harvard University paleobiologist, told National Geographic that it's not clear.
Still, Knoll suggests something massive disturbed the planet's marine ecosystem, and the result
could have turned deadly. The disturbance, he says, could have stirred up the excrement
of marine animals, which would have released a ton of bicarbonate into the upper oceans.
It could have been such a drastic event that he suggests the seas may have bubbled as a result.
Imagine the fizz that comes with pouring a glass of soda into a glass,
and it's possible that's what happened. A large percentage of oceanic life would
have struggled to breathe and eventually fallen asleep ... forever. Knoll says:
"Perhaps the Permian ended with a whimper and not a bang."
So how would that have mattered to life on land? With enough carbon
dioxide floating up into the atmosphere, life on land would have had to endure the
adverse effects of global warming with the sudden addition of so much greenhouse gas.
Scientists have also found a very likely accomplice for the mass extinction,
and it's located in Siberia. It's a massive field of volcanic rock, a reminder of extreme volcanic
activity in eons past. In the late Permian, multiple volcanoes started erupting in one of
the largest volcanic events in Earth's history. This map outlines just how large an area it was,
and essentially, it was a massive field of volcanoes called the Siberian Traps.
The volcanoes also released tons of ash and greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere,
creating an environment where things would inevitably get uncomfortably hot.
According to Stanford, the eruptions could have raised the temperatures of
the oceans by 20 degrees, which caused the oxygen levels to plummet by 80%.
On top of that, the ash from the volcanoes could have blocked out the
sun for a prolonged period of time, robbing plants of their ability to photosynthesize,
and ultimately leading to the collapse of the entire food chain.
Most likely, it wasn't just one event to blame for the Permian mass extinction,
and it was more of a cocktail of catastrophes.
But one thing is for certain — whatever happened, research from Imperial College London suggests
that it also caused the most terrifying rain showers to fall over the entire planet.
Scientists have confirmed that large amounts of acid rain poured over Pangea during this
apocalyptic extinction event, and they did it by finding the compound vanillin — a
byproduct from these menacing drizzles — in the Dolomite Mountains in Italy.
Now, the clearest source for the acid rain would be the volcanic eruptions in Siberia.
This is because the gas that plumes into the atmosphere during these events is thick enough
to block out sunlight for long enough to make temperatures drop. National Geographic describes
the scenario as being the perfect conditions for kick-starting a cascade of acid rain and snow.
"The stormclouds gathering east of Eden suggested that the first thunderstorm was on its way,
and it was going to be a big one."
Surprisingly, this event was more significant for what it did to the
plants than what it did to the animals, at least at first. The acid rain would have
made the ground extremely acidic. This would have made it impossible for flora to thrive,
cutting out the bottom of the food chain and eventually impacting everything.
Let's put things in perspective here. Paul Renne,
a geologist from the Berkeley Geochronology Center, noted,
"In 1783, a volcano called Laki erupted in Iceland. Within a year, global temperature dropped
almost two degrees. Imagine a Laki erupting every year for hundreds of thousands of years."
The world as we know it today — relatively speaking, of course — has seen occasional
volcanic eruptions. But, you have to consider that the eruptions in Siberia are estimated to have
lasted for hundreds of thousands of years. Study of the sediment layers left behind has led a team
of researchers from the universities of Geneva and Zurich to conclude that particles from this
historic eruption blocked out the sun for so long that it sent Earth into an 80,000 year Ice Age.
Evidence of the Ice Age has been found in samples taken from rivers in China, which showed ash
beds and a huge decrease in marine life. That can only be explained by lower ocean levels.
The thinking is that, as glaciers formed in the oceans, the sea level lowered,
and life became impossible for creatures who lived in the receding shallows.
If not already apparent, life under the sea bore the biggest brunt of the apocalypse.
Britannica says that more than 95% of marine life died out, most on account
of low levels of oxygen. Conditions were evidently most severe down in the tropics,
but life there seems to have adapted more readily than creatures who lived closer to the poles.
Researchers from Stanford believe that this was probably due to tropical species
having the ability to pick up and swim towards temperatures that were closer
to their original heat preferences, whereas marine life that lived in
colder areas of the world were already struggling as their waters grew warmer.
Scientists estimate that around 70% of life on land shuffled off this mortal coil during
the Great Dying, with much of it succumbing to a lack of food. How do scientists even know this?
Fossil evidence is next to non-existent, but that’s actually a clue in itself!
Fossils that predate the mass extinction have shown that forests and terrestrial creatures
were thriving before this savage event — or combination of events — took place. Thereafter,
most of them disappear. National Geographic explains the phenomenon by saying that,
suddenly, the fossil record became
"About as species rich as a cornfield."
Now, there's still some disagreement about exactly how long the mass extinction took, but
most scientists agree that it didn't take millions of years to unfold into a total apocalypse. How
do they know this? National Geographic says that the fossil record doesn't show a gradual
decline of life — but rather, a clear-cut boundary of when most living things vanished.
Now, that isn't to say that the conditions leading up to the extinction didn't take some time,
give or take a few million years. But as far as when most marine animals, terrestrial species,
and plants died out, different scientists — including researchers from Stanford University
and MIT — have estimated that it may have taken between a few centuries to 200,000
years. In the grand scheme of things, that's no time at all.
Not all life had a hard time when the majority of Earth’s living things died out.
Quite the contrary, in some cases.
Fungus thrived, and in the rock layers before the Permian extinction,
National Geographic says that researchers from the University of Utrecht have found tons of
fossils that left a legacy of a wildly diverse ecosystem. Moving up in the sedimentary layers,
all signs of pollen and plant particles pretty much vanish
and are replaced with fossilized fungi that once thrived in the dead landscape.
This decaying, rot-filled environment became only suitable for scavengers, which is why scientists
believe smaller animals tended to do better than larger ones during the end of the Permian.
All this rot and mold may have had the Siberian eruptions to partially
thank for their infiltration. Nickel helps certain methane-producing microbes thrive,
and as Britannica notes, it's plentiful during volcanic events. So, some scientists think
that the eruptions not only released a heaping amount of greenhouse gasses but also helped fuel
microorganisms that pump out noxious methane too. It was, essentially, the perfect storm.
Before most of life was destroyed, terrestrial animals looked little like the creatures we're
familiar with today. Earth Archives says that most of the land animals belonged
to one or two groups: the mammalian synapsids, or the reptilian sauropsids.
Surprisingly, there was one extremely important critter that did make it out of
Earth's biggest apocalypse, and it doesn’t appear to fully belong to either group.
This animal looked like a cross between a lizard and a pig. Meet the humble Lystrosaurus.
"Chorizo tacos?"
"Are you saying chorizo tacos?" "Don't play around, because I am super hungry."
National Geographic says that this 3-foot-long animal most likely made it out alive for a few
reasons, starting with big lungs that allowed it to breathe under super difficult conditions.
It also foraged for food underground,
so it's likely their food situation wasn't as desperate as that of many other creatures.
Remnants found of this reptile pig also show its ability to take long strolls to
the far reaches of Pangea. By migrating to ecosystems that would support its survival,
the Lystrosaurus is undoubtedly a species we have to thank for
contributing to the repopulation of the planet, particularly among the mammals.
There's another footnote to this, too. The Lystrosaurus also made a major contribution to
geological research, as fossils found in Africa, China, and Antarctica laid the foundation for
the theory about plate tectonics, how our world used to look, and how it became what it is today.
In a time when carbon dioxide ruled the atmosphere,
National Geographic suggests that certain reptilian-like species
were able to strut into the Triassic thanks to a few helpful advantages.
Like the lizards we find today, early creatures like the rat-sized Kongonaphon, were well suited
to breathing in low-oxygen environments. While one lung pumped, the other absorbed oxygen.
This was a great advantage to have during a time when oxygen was in devastatingly short supply,
and it's probably why reptiles did so much better than their more mammalian-esque counterparts.
There still was quite a bit of evolutionary work to be done before these tiny creatures
could become the glamorous dinosaurs we all admire today. Virginia Museum of Natural
History paleontologist Adam Pritchard says that it didn't happen overnight: The development of the
Archosaurs — the earliest of these reptiles — took between five and 10 million years.
Even that was just the beginning, and it was a long time before they became the
most menacing creatures the planet has ever seen.
According to the fossil record, planetary temperatures from the beginning of this period
were very similar to what we enjoy today. The Permian mass extinction was initiated
by greenhouse gasses, and it's easy to draw an immediate parallel to the situation we've found
ourselves in today. Listen to the science, and it's clear that our planet is in a dire state.
In our 21st century case, though, society is the volcano spewing
loads of poisonous fumes into our delicate atmosphere on a daily basis.
"I love the smell of napalm in the morning."
According to Stanford, projections for Earth's future temperatures show that we'll have heated
the oceans to 20% of what they were in the late Permian by 2100, and up to 50%
by 2300. That is some serious food for thought,
especially since we can see how this whole thing ended up going the last time.
Estimates like these hint at a similar situation we may be dealing with in the very near future.
The question is, who's going to make it through? Will humans get set back thousands,
or even millions of years? From a certain perspective,
that might not be the worst thing — maybe if we get a do-over, we'll get it right next time.
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