Visualization: The tsunami that hit the Earth about 66 million years ago (NOAA)
About 66 million years ago, an asteroid 6 kilometers across crashed into Earth near what is now Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula, wiping out much of life on Earth.
The impact left a crater 177 km wide and 19 km deep and created a massive catastrophic tsunami.
Scientists estimate that the waves reached an unimaginable height of 2.5 kilometers that crashed on land in the Gulf Coast region and that the disaster is considered to be 30,000 times greater than any other recorded event.
Now, scientists from the United States National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) have created a visualization that shows the tsunami spread on the planet as it would have looked about 66 million years ago (the continents painted in black), alongside how it looks today (the white outlines).
Let's remember that the continents change their position at the rate of a few centimeters a year.
The deadliest waves struck near the impact zone around the prehistoric Gulf of Mexico and the Mexican Peninsula, but the massive waves reached nearly all ocean coastlines.
At NOAA, it is assumed that the asteroid wiped out almost all the non-flying dinosaurs and 75% of the other species of birds and animals on Earth.
The asteroid wiped out almost all the non-flying dinosaurs and 75% of the other species of birds and animals on Earth (Photo: ShutterStock)
Major asteroid impacts of this type occur millions of years apart, on average.
But to prevent the human race from ever reaching a similar fate, NASA is researching ways to deflect or destroy any large asteroid that threatens Earth.
Last September, the American space agency's tiny DART spacecraft, designed to test the possibility of derailing asteroids by hitting them, succeeded crash into its target: the Dimorphos Monthly.
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