Re: Climate change

[GERARD A STRAUT <gastraut@ouray.cudenver.edu>]

On Thu, 4 Apr 1996, Tony Mills wrote:

> 
> There is no evidence the dinosaurs ever migrated -north/south. Nor is there 
> any evidence they had navigation skills, nor a weather sattelite to find
> the warmer areas- There may not have been warmer areas. As
> it seems likely a shroud of particulate matter would have  covered
> the entire earth.  With the 
> amount of particulate matter that a bollide would release-it is quite possible
> that  their was no or little light for years.  Plants would die rapidly - The 
> more food you need, the more likely you are to die in those circumstances.
> This applies in the sea (where the base of the food chain in photoplankton)
> just as much as on land.

"Little or no light for years?"

When you say little or no light, do mean pitch dark, twilight or an 
overcast day in Cleveland?

Could any species have survived if there were no light for *years*?  All 
you would have left would be scavengers and then some fungi.  Has 
anyone come up with a model of the `Nuclear Winter'?  There would have to 
be a point where most, if not all, life would disappear.

I have never been very clear on that part of the comet impact explanation 
of mass extinctions.  

Jerry Straut
Information and Learning Technologies Program
Division of Technology and Special Services
University of Colorado at Denver
Denver,  CO  88217

303.933.0754 voice
303.933.0754 fax

gastraut@ouray.cudenver.edu