What Exactly Killed The Dinosaurs? | Earth | BBC Earth Science

Since the 1980s, scientists have believed that the main culprit for the dinosaur extinction was an asteroid. It came from the far reaches of the solar system, and was the size of Mount Everest.

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Earth (2023)
Discover the astonishing four-billion-year story of the place we call home, told over five dramatic episodes. This revealing biography of Earth explores the planet's most epic moments. From the first raindrops that turned it into a water world to the arrival of its most incredible inhabitants, us. But humans take a back seat in this narrative. Instead, Earth is placed centre stage. We see what happened to our world before we even crawled from the mud – including massive bombardments from space, extreme changes in climate and the collision of whole continents. The series uses the trademark dramatic storytelling techniques of The Planets to bring this unique story of creation to life.

[junemacdonald]

Dinosaurs boss: “so you’re still coming in today, though, right?”

[mothermovementa]

The dinosaurs must have been terrified 😢

[RamenChomp]

These visuals have no business looking so stunning

[xafar]

"If the dinosaurs had had a space program, they would still be here today..." Carl Sagan

[SamoStudios]

It's disturbing to think that this awesome animation (and most asteroid impact depictions) is still very watered down compared to reality, since if you were anywhere in line of sight, you would be vaporized immediately, before it even struck the ground.

[EVILalwaysDIES]

Impressive how even after that, the earth still grew back alive

[vindinol]

It's frightening that we are so helpless even it happens today

[tanganbabyrosak]

animation is getting better each year.maybe one day we will see a precise rendition of the event that kill all the dinosaurs

[_MaZTeR_]

3:15 Looks almost like the Death Star hitting the desert planet in Rogue One

[fabiansackl]

03:14 is equally breathtakingly stunning as it is inherently frightening.

[NeilsonBuntowa]

Imagine the awesome species lost during the impact leaving no history to be discovered

[thecreativemastermindnetwo]

Finally, Now that's what I'm talking about, they really nailed the accurate depiction of explosion of the impact in both ground level view and in space view rather than a stereotypical mushroom cloud we always see in many asteroid impact documentaries, hope other documentaries will learn about the impact explosion dynamics from them in the future

[OmegaTrooper]

3:01 shout out to the cameraman that gave his life for this shot. Lost, but never forgotten.

[UUwUU]

Poor little dinosaurs. They had no idea what was going on. Just scared and in pain.

[whaloe.builds]

The asteroid was likely a faster death for the dinosaurs as an extinction was pending anyways. If you look through the geological timeline there was a period of massive volcanic active before and after the impact. The Deccan traps formed on the moving indian plate and had already induced climate change, a similar effect to the Permian Triassic extinction. Its possible that without the volcanic activity the asteroid may not have wiped out the dinosaurs. The deccan traps is undermined by the asteriod but recent work suggests that the volcanic activity played a major role in the K-Pg event

[Pranjalchoudhary]

03:05 damn that's some good animation. Looks epic!

[bhbluebird]

Nice graphics, seriously. I watched the impact scenes from the ground perspective and space perspective several times.

[lickopotamusslurperton]

Amazingly, you can still see its impact and damage even today.

[oneone]

The explosion shown in this video is lot better with more clarity than the Oppenheimer hype

[ct]

you know it's massive when a shock-wave large enough to flatten trees for 600 miles in diameter was made BEFORE the asteroid even hit the ground! not that it mattered, but fascinating air can be super-heated and compressed on such a large scale. terrifying.