THIS UNNAMED GEOLOGICAL formation is the likely result of wind, rain and time eroading away surface material to expose what at one time would have lava (magma) that had cooled and solidified. Copyright © 2010 by DL Tolleson. All Rights Reserved.
COMING INTO OR out of the Chisos Mountains, this is the northwest view and is several miles south of Panther Junction and the headquarters for Big Bend National Park. Copyright © 2010 by DL Tolleson. All Rights Reserved.
THE CLARET CUP is covered in barbed spines and blooms a reddish, cup-shaped flower from about April to June or July in Big Bend National Park. Copyright © 2010 by DL Tolleson. All Rights Reserved.
THIS VIEW FROM a formation called, “The Window,” looks out from the westside of the Chisos Mountains in Big Bend National Park. Copyright © 2010 by DL Tolleson. All Rights Reserved.
INDIAN HEAD MOUNTAIN and its southern region offers this “leaning” wall of geology at the western boundary of Big Bend National Park. The rocks of the foreground are boulders ranging from man-sized on up. Copyright © 2010 by DL Tolleson. All Rights Reserved.
MASSIVE AND TOWERING, this wall of the geology is at least a couple of hundrend feet high and situated in the Indian Head area of Big Bend National Park. Copyright © 2010 by DL Tolleson. All Rights Reserved.
WIDE-OPEN PANORAMAS and mountainous terrain such as this are routine along roadside in Big Bend National Park. Copyright © 2010 by DL Tolleson. All Rights Reserved.
THE SOUTHWEST SIDE of the Chisos Mountains, also known as the Chisos Mountain Basin and home to the lodge in Big Bend National Park. Copyright © 2011 by DL Tolleson. All Rights Reserved.
A FALLEN TREE is an impassable barrier in an otherwise debris-free dry riverbed in Big Bend National Park. Copyright © 2010 by DL Tolleson. All Rights Reserved.
INDIGENOUS TO TEXAS, New Mexico and Arizona, Javelinas in Big Bend National Park genetically differ from swine. Copyright © 2010 by DL Tolleson. All Rights Reserved.
LOST MINE TRAIL in Big Bend National Park, looking southward over Juniper Canyon, the Chisos Mountain’s Northeast Rim and into Mexico. Copyright © 2010 by DL Tolleson. All Rights Reserved.
A TREE SILHOUETTED against the night sky as seen from Chisos Basin in Big Bend National Park. Copyright © 2010 by DL Tolleson. All Rights Reserved.
THIS VIEW EAST of a volcano is an illusion of the setting sun streaming through the Chisos Basin area behind Casa Grande Peak in Big Bend National Park. Copyright © 2010 by DL Tolleson. All Rights Reserved.
WRIGHT MOUNTAIN in background at Big Bend National Park. Copyright © 2010 by DL Tolleson. All Rights Reserved.
A VIEW WESTWARD after sundown from the Indian Head area of Big Bend National Park. Copyright © 2010 by DL Tolleson. All Rights Reserved.
A CAMERA COMPENSATION for the limited light after sundown provides this view westward from the Indian Head area of Big Bend National Park. Copyright © 2010 by DL Tolleson/Camera One. All Rights Reserved.
SANTA ELENA CANYON after sunset, as seen from the Chimneys in Big Bend National Park. Copyright © 2010 by DL Tolleson/Camera One. All Rights Reserved.

DL Tolleson.com

Author, Photographer, Researcher, Artist, Adventurer and Buccaneer Extraordinaire

“Or at least that’s the plan each morning after coffee.”

Publication History: Death of the Dinosaurs: A Magazine Article Review. Copyright © 1988, 2009, 2019 by DL Tolleson. All Rights Reserved. Excerpts from this work are permissible if author attribution is included. However, beyond this no part of this material may be reproduced in any form or by any means without written permission from the author.

Tolleson, DL. “Death of the Dinosaurs: A Magazine Article Review.”
DLTolleson.com, 2009.
http://www.dltolleson.com/research/dinosaurdeaths.php.

Tolleson, DL. “Death of the Dinosaurs: A Magazine Article Review.”
TheLighthousePress.com, 2016.
http://www.thelighthousepress.com/dltolleson.com/research/dinosaurdeaths.php.

Description: Analysis » Research—255 words (Not including Work Cited).

Commentary: Death of the Dinosaurs: A Magazine Article Review was authored as part of required curriculum in my second college geology course (Historical Geology). The article serving as the basis of this review was found and researched in cooperation with fellow-student Terry Mitchell.

Since the publication of the Science Digest article, and the writting of this review, the theory of an extinction event prompted by the impact of a celestial body has garnered wider acceptance. However, it should be noted that at the time of this proposed theory in the 1980s, the suggestion of a massive cataclysmic celestial impact was not new. As covered in my commentary for the paper The Secret of Atlantis: An Examination (available through this site’s Compendium), author Ignatius Donnelly (1831-1901) argued in 1883 for catastrophic planetary changes at the behest of a comet’s near orbital pass dispersing massive amounts of gravel. And prior to his death in 1965, author Otto Muck argued for an Asteroid striking Earth with the total force of, “4x1015 tons per second” in The Secret of Atlantis. What followed, according to Muck, was best described as a worldwide catastrophe.

—DL Tolleson

DEATH of the DINOSAURS: A MAGAZINE ARTICLE REVIEW
DL Tolleson

There is a new school of thought concerning the extinction of prehistoric dinosaurs that disappeared from the Earth in the late Cretaceous period. The theory holds that a comet, asteroid or other large extraterritorial body collided with the Earth 65 million years ago and ended the 160 million-year-reign of the dinosaurs. The theory has attracted a wide acceptance as fact in the scientific community while becoming adversely unpopular with a number of scientists.

Further evidence found within layers of sediment in California have lead some scientists to believe they are dealing with molecules deposited by meteors.

In 1980 Luis Alvarez published a theory that stated a massive impact occurred at the end of the Cretaceous period. The theory was based on an element called Iridium, which was found with dinosaur’s fossils. Virtually non-existent in the Earth’s crust, Iridium is 10,000 times more likely to be present in extraterrestrial rocks. Finding Iridium in clays of the same age located in two separate areas of the world caused the Alvarez team to propose that the element had come from an extraterrestrial body striking the Earth. The impact, they proposed, created so much dust in the atmosphere that sunlight was blocked and prevented photosynthesis. Their conclusions set forth a revised theory of evolution.

There are scientists who completely agree with the theory and also suggest that mass extinctions occur approximately every 26 million years. Critics argue there aren’t facts to support repeated mass extinction events and that such schools of thought are not grounded is scientific evidence.

Work Cited

• Rensberger, Boyce. ‘Death of Dinosaurs: The True Story,’ Science Digest, May 1986, pps. 77—89.