Clovis people disappeared almost 13 thousand years ago
The main evidence for the Clovis meteorite theory of disappearance is believed to be traces of platinum, a metal associated with the fall of the meteorite. Scientists have found them at the archaeological sites of the ancient inhabitants of America. The Clovis people disappeared from North America about 12,800 years ago. At the same time, about 35 species of large animals, which they hunted, also disappeared. These events took place at the beginning of another sharp cold snap, which lasted 1400 years and is called the Younger Dryas.
The reason for the onset of the next cold snap also remains a mystery. According to one theory, it was triggered by the fall of a large meteorite or asteroid, but the crater was never found. According to the study published in Scientific Reports, traces of platinum were found at 11 archaeological sites of the Clovis people in the United States. Moreover, they were found in layers of the earth that date back to the beginning of the Younger Dryas.
If the cause of the Lesser Dryas was a meteorite fall, then it was most likely a rain of small meteorites, and not one large one. A meteor shower could well have thrown huge amounts of dust into the atmosphere and lead to a sharp and severe cooling.
"Platinum is rarely found in the earth's crust, but is often present in asteroids, meteorites and comets," ibtimes quoted journal article author Christopher Moore from the University of South Carolina.
Earlier traces of platinum were also found in the Greenland ice. They, too, date from the beginning of the Younger Dryas and are similar to platinum found at archaeological sites of the Clovis people, one of the first inhabitants of North America.
Zakhar RADOV
