Imagine If You Live In Rain For 2 Million Years

Do you enjoy the rainy season? Maybe there are those who like rain (usually for those of you who are romantic) or there are those who really hate the rainy season (especially those who use motorbikes). During this season, it can rain every day, sometimes from early morning to late afternoon. But if the rainy season that has only been 6 months annoys you, what about the 2 million years of rain?

Can that happen Sis? Yes Can and I'll explain. The rainy period of 2 million years occurred in ancient times (when humans were absent) and was called the "Carnian Pluvial Event", about 230 million years ago. Uniquely, this event caused dinosaurs to rule the next period, namely the Jurassic Era.

Geologically, this Earth since its formation (about 4.6 billion years ago) until now, is divided into several epochs. The first period is called "Precambrian" (meaning "Before the Cambrian") in which in the middle of this period (according to the Theory of Evolution) life began to appear. This is evidenced by the appearance of the first fossils in the form of bacteria that are 3 billion years old. The second period, called the "Paleozoic", is divided into several eras, of which the most important is the "Cambrian", where simple life suddenly "exploded" into a multitude of very complex types of living things.

The next period is called the "Mesozoic" period, during which life on land began to develop and the most famous creatures from the past emerged, namely the dinosaurs. The last era is the era we live in today, namely "Cenozoic" which began with the extinction of the dinosaurs and life on land was dominated by mammals (including us).

The Mesozoic era that we are talking about today is divided into 3 eras, namely the Triassic, Jurassic, and Cretaceous periods. It was during the Triassic period that the "Carnian Pluvial Event" took place. In the early Triassic period, Earth was not what we know today. There aren't 5 continents till now. All continents and landmasses merge into one super large continent called "Pangaea" (derived from the word "Pan" which means "all" and "Gaia" which is the name of the Goddess of Earth in Greek mythology. The ocean is not divided into 4 oceans as it is now, but there is only one ocean called Ocean Tethys (named after the wife of the god Poseidon).

Since there is only one super large landmass, winds from the oceans carrying wet air can never enter the super continent Pangaea. As a result, the climate on the super continent is very dry. The landscape is dominated by hot deserts and inhabited by strange animals, one of which is the Kannemeyeriiform dicynodonts and the Hyperodapedon rhynchosaurus, both of which are herbivores (please googling for the oddity of these creatures). There are also types of dinosaurs that lived at that time but were still small, such as Eoraptor.

But suddenly the hot climate of the Carnian period was replaced by a wet and humid climate characterized by years of rain. This period is called the "Carnian Pluvial Event" or CPE. What caused it? Ancient climate change was triggered by a volcanic eruption called "Wrangellia" (now Canada and Alaska) which triggered the release of greenhouse gases such as CO2 and SO2.

Like our modern times, these gases trigger "global warming" which in turn will accelerate the water cycle, as a result, rain will fall continuously. If that wasn't enough, in what is now eastern Europe, new mountains called "Cimmerian Orogeny" have appeared which created the monsoon climate of Pangaea.

But how has life on Pangea adjusted to sudden climate changes? Unfortunately, the CPE event caused the mass extinction of creatures that inhabit Pangaea that have adapted to dry climates. Not only on land, many sea creatures are also experiencing extinction. How can? Only rain, what's the connection? It turns out that ancient "global warming" also spurred "acidification" or sea water turned to acid, which eventually triggered the mass extinction of marine inhabitants at that time.

But this CPE event is actually good news for the dinosaurs.Dinosaurs were warm-blooded, which meant they could regulate their own body temperature. The opponents were" poikilothermic "or cold blooded animals. Warm blooded animals survived better when dealing with changes in temperature from hot to cold Due to continuous rain, rain which continuously also makes the plants thrive and the forest is dominated by giant ferns.

It is not clear how the CPE ended, it may have something to do with the Continent of Pangaea which was split in two into Gondwana (South America, Africa, Antarctica, Australia and India) and Laurasia (Europe, Asia and North America). But what is clear is that the 2 million years of rain, apart from destroying many lives, also caused other kinds of life to prevail and emerge victorious.

As a result of this CPE event, in the Jurassic period (the period after the Triassic ended), the world was colonized by giant dinosaurs. The oceans were ruled by Icthyosaurs (which exist in Jurassic World) and Plesiosaurs (if you have ever known the Loch Ness monster, now the Loch Ness monster is considered Pleisosaurus). While the land is controlled by Stegosaurus and Brachiosaurus. The biggest predator at that time was Allosaurus.

But well-known dinosaurs like the Pterosaurs, Triceratops, Velociraptor, and T-rex didn't appear until the next period, Cretaceous (so it actually got a movie wrongly called "Jurassic Park" but T-rex came up, if you want to be more accurate the name. "Cretaceous Park") .

Of course it's complicated, if we live in the CPE era, we have to be on guard with an umbrella every day, not to mention that floods will definitely make us stressed (plus we are still being chased by dinosaurs). But it also serves as a reminder to us, how climate change can trigger such a catastrophe. If CPE in the Triassic period was triggered by natural causes, then climate change is currently man-made. So get ready, because what we sow we will definitely reap.