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USGS Cartographer's Computer Wizardry - Asteroid Impact and Flying Dinosaurs Come To Salt Lake City


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U.S. Department of the Interior
U.S. Geological Survey
Western Region Outreach Office
345 Middlefield Road, MS 144
Menlo Park, CA 94025

Contact: Pat Jorgenson, Phone: 640-329-4000, Fax: 650-329-4013

Release: October 16, 1997
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USGS Cartographer's Computer "Wizardry" ... Asteroid Impact And Flying
Dinosaurs Come To Salt Lake City

The asteroid impact that occurred 65 million years ago comes to life on the
computer screen, Tuesday, Oct. 21, as a research cartographer with the
U.S. Geological Survey demonstrates his latest HyperCard animation at
the annual meeting of the Geological Society of America (GSA) in Salt
Lake City.

Tau Rho Alpha, a research cartographer with the USGS in Menlo Park,
Calif., will show fellow scientists and educators how the massive impact
that is believed to have caused the extinction of the dinosaurs can be
better understood by elementary through college-level students through
the computer animation and an accompanying teacher's guide.

In Alpha's animation, the peanut-shaped asteroid is shown spinning toward
Earth, where a Triceratops is seen, and heard, munching away on the
Chicxulub Plain, better known to us as the Yucatan Peninsula. The asteroid
hits and bam! the next thing we see is the skeleton of the Triceratops lying
on the seared landscape, while the surviving small mammals, such as mice
and moles, forage in the debris, in their successful quest for survival.

Following the animation, patterns for paper models of the Triceratops and
a Pterosaur (flying dinosaur) come on the screen, ready to be printed out,
colored and glued together. The finished Triceratops measures about eight
inches, from horny head to tail, and stands about five inches high. The
Pterosaur is about six inches long, from beak to tail, and has a wing span
of about five inches.

The accompanying 14-page teacher's guide explains the impact of the
Chicxulub impact; how scientists determined that such an event had
occurred; and where it occurred. A glossary defines the terms used in the
report, and an abbreviated geologic time scale defines the various eras
when the dinosaurs and their relatives roamed the earth. Descriptions of
the Ceratopsians, or "horned-faced dinosaurs" and Pterosauria, "flying
reptiles," accompany the model patterns of the animals.

The HyperCard diskette version of the report is available from the USGS-
Information Services, Open-file Report Section, Box 25286, MS 517,
Denver Federal Center, Denver, CO 80225, or by calling 1-800-435-7627
or 303-202-4200. The cost is $10 each. A paper version is available at the
same address, at a cost of $5.50 plus a handling charge of $3.50. When
ordering, be sure to specify: OF 97-442-A, for the diskette, or OF97-442-B,
for the paper version. It also can be obtained from the Survey's Learning
Web site. The URL is: http://www.usgs.gov/education/animations/

Alpha will demonstrate the computer animation at 9:45 a.m., Tuesday, Oct.
21, in Room 150 of the Salt Palace Convention Center. The product also
will be demonstrated and will be for sale at the USGS booth in the
convention's exhibit hall, Oct. 20-23.