Re: Theories on the extinction of dinosaurs

[TomHopp@aol.com]

In a message dated 11/14/99 7:19:28 AM, Larry Febo wrote:

<< I never considered the heat-shockwave to have circled the entire earth. 
North America yes,...but the rest of the earth?? Then again, I haven`t 
calculated any of the physics involved. (It just dosen`t  "seem" to have

been large enough for all that). Can you provide references for your 
scenario? I have T-Rex and the Crater of Doom by Alvarez, and Night comes to 
the Cretaceous by Powell, and haven`t read either yet....(waiting for the

next snowstorm maybe..8^). >>

We had a go-round on this list a few months ago on the subject. I think that 
the idea might actually have arisen right here, though by whom it was first 
mooted, I don't recall. Maybe Jim Cunningham. My own thinking is, if the 
impactor was pure comet, and not part or all asteroid, then the hole in the 
ground might be deceptively small. Furthermore, even Alvarez seems to neglect 
the hypersonic shock wave in his book, if I recall right from a scanning of 
the text I did months ago. He was into dust, understandably, since it ties 
into his scientific datum, the iridium layer. Free of any such data-fixation, 
I'm willing to speculate a little. What was that p-chem equation, PV=nRT or 
some such thing? Pressure converts to heat. Whatever. I think I got a C in 
that class, you know, back when they gave grades.

- Tom Hopp