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Rutgers Geologists Find Evidence in New Jersey of a Massive Meteorite Strike

Rutger University

May 27, 1997

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

TO THE POINT: Rutgers geologists find "one of the final pieces in the puzzle
of what happened to the dinosaurs"

NEW BRUNSWICK/PISCATAWAY, N.J. -- Rutgers geologists are the first to find
evidence in New Jersey that a meteorite strike in Mexico millions of years
ago formed a massive cloud of vaporized rock and other materials that caused
widespread extinctions of plankton, and is almost certainly the same event
that caused the extinction of the dinosaurs.

"The cloud of materials was so fast-moving and huge that it got from Mexico
to New Jersey in about 10 minutes and fell to earth forming a layer of glass
beads known as spherules that is more than 2 inches thick," said Kenneth G.
Miller, professor and vice chairman of geological sciences at Rutgers.

The event resulted in the extinction of more than 90 percent of the plankton
found in earlier deposits, he said, unequivocally linking the Mexican
meteorite impact to the mass extinctions at the end of the Mesozoic period.

He described the findings as "one of the final pieces in the puzzle of what
happened to the dinosaurs."

"Although the 'kill mechanism' for the extinction of the dinosaurs isn't
definite," he said, "most scientists favor a scenario in which dust from the
impact shut down photosynthesis for a short period, resulting in the
collapse of the dinosaurs' food chain."

Miller and Richard K. Olsson, a professor of geological sciences at Rutgers,
presented their findings Wednesday (May 28) at the spring meeting of the
American Geophysical Union (AGU) in Baltimore. The AGU is the premier
organization of geophysicists and geologists in the United States. The paper
has been accepted for publication in the journal Geology published by the
Geological Society of America.

Miller teaches undergraduate and graduate courses in marine geology and
stratigraphy. Olsson teaches undergraduate and graduate courses in
micropaleontology and earth history. Both are members of the Faculty of Arts
and Sciences at Rutgers in New Brunswick.

Miller and Peter Sugarman of the New Jersey Geological Survey (NJGS) are
co-chief scientists for the New Jersey Coastal Plain Drilling Project, a
Rutgers-led effort to study global sea-level changes over the past 65
million years. The project is part of the international Ocean Drilling
Program, which is funded in part by the National Science Foundation (NSF).

The project drilled a borehole nearly 2,000 feet deep in Bass River State
Park, 13 miles north of Atlantic City, in November 1996, Miller explained.

"Examination of the core from this borehole showed a layer of ballistic
ejecta at the 1,260-foot level, immediately above the Cretaceous-Tertiary
boundary, which marks the end of Mesozoic time," he said. "The layer is
composed of spherules, which are glass droplets formed from vaporized rock,
and condensate matter that fell to earth from a cloud of materials formed by
the meteorite's impact at Chicxulub, Mexico, 65 million years ago.

"The spherule layer settled on a muddy sea bottom making impressions of the
glass droplets. The impressions indicate that deposition of the layer was
geologically instantaneous. The discovery of this material so far from the
crater confirms that devastating environmental effects resulted from a
single impact that occurred precisely at Cretaceous-Tertiary boundary time."

Cooperating in the project are scientists from the Lamont-Doherty Earth
Observatory of Columbia University, Queens College, and the City University
of New York. The effort is funded by NSF, the NJGS and the U.S. Geological
Survey.

NOTE: Miller and Olsson will return to New Jersey and be available for
interviews Thursday (May 29). Kenneth Miller can be reached by calling (908)
445-3622 (office) or (908) 249-1366 (home). Richard Olsson can be reached
by calling (908) 445-3043 (office).