Scientists will continue research operations inside Chicxulub crater

The international scientific community will continue drilling and researching in Yucatan’s Chicxulub crater off the coast of Progreso, in order to understand the phenomena of extinction and geological changes that the world suffered millions of years ago.

The crater of 300 kilometers in diameter was formed by the fall of a meteor 65 million years ago, near the port of Chicxulub, 30 kilometers away from Merida, and caused the extinction of 75% of the animal species on Earth, including the dinosaurs.

In 2016, 32 scientists from 11 countries, 3 of them from Mexico, integrated “La Expedición 364”, aboard a marine platform, in which they extracted 840 meters of rocks at a depth of 1,340 meters (4,400 feet).

“That allowed them to travel through an area of ​​the earth’s crust that had not been transported to the crater,” said Raúl Godoy, Secretary of Research, Innovation and Higher Education.

International investigations will also continue on land, in the ports of Sisal and Celestún, very close to Chicxulub and will have different investigation objectives.

The new perforations are the next step in this project, which will allow to study in detail the geological effects and the extinction processes.

“How life recovered after the impact and what happens after 10 million years in abrupt climatic events,” said Ligia Pérez Cruz, from UNAM’s Geophyscs Institute (Institutito de Geofísica de la UNAM).

The scientists point out that with the fall of the meteor in Chicxulub, the extinction is peculiar and different from other processes occurred in other parts of the world, since species were extinguished in the mainland and in the oceans, both animals, plants and insects.

Source: noticieros.televisa.com

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