Volcano caused mass extinction?

I seem to remember that a huge asteroid used to be a popular theory for mass extinctions years back.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/01/120109132746.htm

Could it have been a volcano?

Originally posted by Metal Brain
I seem to remember that a huge asteroid used to be a popular theory for mass extinctions years back.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/01/120109132746.htm

Could it have been a volcano?

They are called "Super Volcanos", just like we have in Yellow Stone.

Originally posted by Metal Brain
I seem to remember that a huge asteroid used to be a popular theory for mass extinctions years back.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/01/120109132746.htm

Could it have been a volcano?

You might be thinking of the Chicxulub crater from about 65 million years ago.

Originally posted by whodey
They are called "Super Volcanos", just like we have in Yellow Stone.

Actually no, Super Volcanoes are smaller.

A Super Volcano is basically just a ridiculously oversized version of a regular volcano.

Traps (basalt floods) are something different.

It's basically when a huge plume of super hot magma makes its way up from the mantle
near the core and pours out through huge cracks in the Earth's surface.

They can erupt almost continually for tens of thousands to millions of years, and create
lava flows tens of thousands of miles square and miles deep.

About a third of India was created by the Decan Traps.


The next one (if it is predictable at all) will probably happen in africa along the great rift.

There was one that occurred when Australia separated from Antarctica and africa is in the process
off carving itself in half so while the next one could happen anywhere that is probably the most likely site.

But then we might not get another for tens or hundreds of millions of years, so who knows.

I wouldn't want to be around if one did happen though, a super volcano going off would be bad enough but at least
you could see an end in site. If a new set of Traps start up they will keep going for generation after generation after
generation with no end in site for tens of millennia at the very least.

A super volcano causes a volcanic winter for a few years, A basalt flood can cause one for millennia.