It's official: An asteroid wiped out the dinosaurs

From Reuters and in yesterday's papers, a panel of 41 scientists from across the world reviewed 20 years' worth of research to try to confirm the cause of the so-called Cretaceous-Tertiary (KT) extinction, which created a "hellish environment" around 65 million years ago and wiped out more than half of all species on the planet.

Scientific opinion was split over whether the extinction was caused by an asteroid or by volcanic activity in the Deccan Traps in what is now India, where there were a series of super volcanic eruptions that lasted around 1.5 million years. The new study, conducted by scientists from Europe, the United States, Mexico, Canada and Japan and published in the journal Science, found that a 15-kilometre (9 miles) wide asteroid slamming into Earth at Chicxulub in what is now Mexico was the culprit.

Well, here's another theory :)

And here are some dinosaur toys Jared & Javon played with when they were much younger. When you have a son and when he reaches the age where he starts to discover dinosaurs, you suddenly find yourself scrambling for all the dinosaur books to try and learn their names so that you can spew out the jargon like it's part of your nature because when he is so young, in his most innocent eyes you are the most knowledgeable person who has all the answers to his questions (thanks to books like "How Things Work?" and stuff - now there's Wiki and instant knowledge at your fingertips or you simply just google it)

Names like Ankylosaurus, Allosaurus, Brachiosaurus, Compsognathus, Dilophosaurus, Diplodocus, Gallimimus, Pachycephalosaurus, Parasaurolophus, Pteranodon, Spinosaurus, Triceratops, Tyrannosaurus, Stegosaurus, Velociraptor became part of your vocabulary. It didn't help that at about that time, the Jurassic Park movies came out and they were such a hit!




And then there were the toys from "Extreme Dinosaurs", an American animated series from 1997 based on a toy line from Mattel starring a foursome of heroic anthropomorphic dinosaurs and their nemeses: a trio of malevolent velociraptors with plans for world domination.

Spike (Triceratops): A martial arts expert, Spike is armed with a hard head that can bust through, apparently, anything.

T-Bone (Tyrannosaurus rex): The team leader. He is easily the most serious of the group, although he displays a more casual side. Whereas the others often become distracted by their own interests, T-Bone is always focused.

Hardrock (Ankylosaurus): Joined the team partway through the series. Hardrock is from another dimension and is far-too-friendly by nature, but is still capable of fighting effectively. Of the group, he is the pacifist and most understanding.

Evil Bad Rap: the orange, striped leader of the Raptors, who has a metal brace-like device attached to his mouth (and, briefly, a weapon on one hand that can dissolve solid matter effortlessly). His goal is to permanently alter the earth's biosphere to closely resemble the Mesozoic.

I seem to have misplaced Bullzeye (Pteranodon): A wise-cracking youngster, whose chief weapon is a shriek of ear-splitting frequency.