An international panel of experts have come to the conclusion that a space impact was responsible for the extinction of the dinosaurs.

They reached the consensus after conducting the most wide-ranging analysis yet of the evidence.
Writing in Science journal, they rule out alternative theories such as large-scale volcanism

The analysis has been discussed at the 41st Lunar and Planetary Science Conference (LPSC) in the US.A panel of 41 international experts reviewed 20 years’ worth of research to determine the cause of the Cretaceous-Tertiary (K-T) mass extinction, around 65 million years ago.

The extinction wiped out more than half of all species on the planet, including the dinosaurs, bird-like pterosaurs and large marine reptiles, clearing the way for mammals to become the dominant species on Earth.

Their review of the evidence shows that the extinction was caused by a massive asteroid or comet smashing into Earth at Chicxulub on Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula.

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Cracked.com has posted an interesting list about six incredible historic acts of revenge.

In 1807, a French dude named Pierre Picaud had just about everything on life’s menu going for him: a steady job as a cobbler, a home just outside the lovely French riviera and an insanely hot, wealthy French girlfriend. Everybody knows one jerk like that.

Pierre’s three friends Loupian, Solari and Chaubart always thought they’d like to take him down a notch, so when he eventually proposed, his buddies seized on the opportunity to plan the most dick bachelor party prank in history–by sending a letter to the feds accusing Pierre of being an English spy. We don’t know whether or not they also tied him naked to a lamp post.

He was arrested and imprisoned in the brutal Fenestrelle fortress for seven years without charge, and to make things even worse, his former friend Loupian spent that time comforting Pierre’s ex-fiance with his penis.

The Payback:

If you think this sounds like we’re just confusing The Count of Monte Cristo with reality, you’re half right. The guy who wrote that book, Alexandre Dumas, based his novel on police records detailing the true case of Pierre Picaud, whose incredible story of revenge was almost too strange to be believed even then.

Details are a little hazy, but at some point during Pierre’s imprisonment, he somehow became a millionaire. Apparently he had a wealthy cellmate named Father Torri with whom he struck up such a close friendship that Torri left him his fortune after he died. Either that, or he knocked over an armored car while on parole. Either way, Pierre made use of his newfound wealth to exact a tornado of justice worthy of a Death Wish sequel.

Over the course of 10 years, Pierre used his new wealth to brutally trick, ruin and murder his oppressors. One by one, his former friends wound up mysteriously dead, but it was that cuckolding prick Loupian who got the shortest end of the stick. Pierre first tricked the man’s daughter into marrying a criminal (whom Pierre had arrested), killing the poor girl out of shock. Pierre then burned Loupian’s business to the ground, had Loupian’s son arrested and then finished things off by stabbing the already ruined man to death, which was probably a small mercy.

Pierre was eventually kidnapped and killed by a fourth friend, Allut, who knew about the plot to frame Pierre but failed to report it. According to the French police, his insanely detailed deathbed confession was the basis for the entire report, which means that the only reason we know about it at all is because Pierre didn’t live quite long enough to finish the job.

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A German tourist has been slammed after breaking into a protected Maori site in New Zealand and posting photographs online.

The tourist posted online pictures of her visit to Maerewhenua Maori rock art site in South Canterbury in which she climbed around protective barriers, the Timaru Herald reported.

Ngai Tahu Maori Rock Art Trust curator Amanda Symon, who had been looking after the site for six years, was shocked and disgusted at the “incredibly stupid” actions of the tourist.

“They have come here and desecrated one of our heritage sites. It is just completely thoughtless to squeeze in there. She is brushing past a rock drawing so there is huge potential to do damage,” she told the paper.

The paintings depicted at the site ranged from birds and reptiles to European sailing ships.

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AFP has put out an interesting stories about the archaeological goings-on in the Nubian Desert of northern Sudan.

There is not a tourist in sight as the sun sets over sand-swept pyramids at Meroe, but archaeologists say the Nubian Desert of northern Sudan holds mysteries to rival ancient Egypt.

“There is a magic beauty about these sites that is heightened by the privilege of being able to admire them alone, with the pyramids, the dunes and the sun,” says Guillemette Andreu, head of antiquities at Paris’ Louvre museum.

“It really sets them apart from the Egyptian pyramids, whose beauty is slightly overshadowed by the tourist crowds.”

Meroe lies around 200 kilometres (120 miles) northeast of Sudan’s capital Khartoum and was the last capital of Kush, also called Nubia, an ancient kingdom centered on the confluence of the Blue Nile, the White Nile and the River Atbara.

Kush was one of the earliest civilisations in the Nile valley and, at first, was dominated by Egypt. The Nubians eventually gained their independence and, at the height of their power, they turned the table on Egypt and conquered it in the 8th century BC.

They occupied the entire Nile valley for a century before being forced back into what is now Sudan.

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The Sydney Morning Herald has posted an article about the mystery of how thirty strands of Napoleon’s hair ended up in Sydney, Australia.

Genetic testing has never been carried out, but there are two historical facts in its favour.

Firstly, that Napoleon’s head was shorn in the moments after his death and locks were distributed.

Secondly, that a man mentioned in a letter that accompanied the lock, Captain William Crockat, was at the deathbed of the deposed emperor, and therefore would have had an opportunity to take a lock or two for himself.

The letter, from a Scotsman named Ned Todd, states he was given the hair by a woman:

“If I mistake not she said that her brother [Major Crockat] had himself cut the lock from the head of the illustrious dead.”

Ms Betteridge said she looked forward to the task ahead of discovering exactly how it found its way to Sydney.

“I don’t want it to be a fait accompli,” she said. “It’s nice to have a story that unfolds.”

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