Monday, November 13, 2017, 12:15PM - 1:15PM
Speaker
Brian Toon
ATOC/LASP
Location:
SEEC room S228 (Sievers Room)
4001 Discovery Drive, Boulder, CO
Sixty six million years ago a mountain sized chunk of rock, traveling at more than 10 times the muzzle velocity of an assault rifle, slammed into the shallow sea covering what is now the Yucatan Peninsula of Mexico. Shortly thereafter the 5th of the Earth’s great mass extinctions occurred. Many of the same phenomena that killed the dinosaurs may occur if there is a nuclear war. Here I describe how the dinosaurs died, and the possible consequences of small and large nuclear wars. Unfortunately, at present, we are not capable of stopping an asteroid from hitting the planet. It remains to be seen if we can prevent a nuclear conflict.
Audience
Free and open to the public.