The explanation of the origin of the Cenotes The most accepted theory of the cause of dinosaur extinction, is the meteorite that fell 65 millions years ago, here a few miles north of Merida. This theory is relatively new, because in the 70’s The government began to make excavations in the Yucatan peninsula searching for oil. They didn´t found oil, instead they found a very rare mineral to be terrestrial ... They found a thin layer of clay containing large amounts of a rare metal called Iridium; that layers coinciding at the same time line of the big dinosaurs extinctions and many other species. This mineral is only found in meteorites that have fallen to earth. The Yucatan peninsula today After making long excavations, geologists discovered the same material around the entire Yucatan peninsula. The quantity of Iridium found, is such that scientists believed that the size of the meteorite was 10 to 15 km. But where is the crater? The Yucatan floor is completely flat, there is no a single mountain. Years later and with satellite technology, NASA leaded a series of gravitometries (studies measuring gravity) and found a huge footprint of what could have been the crater: The long of this footprint is about is about 200 kilometers in diameter and has a depth of 30 to 50 km down. WOW!
The gravitometry study of what is below the ground
The gravitometry in 3D
This is the diameter of the crater. Look at the size, It´s about 200 km The impact was about this point.
This is my town: MĂŠrida
Another gravitometry with the real scale
And yes, there is a visual evidence: a peculiar formation a “belt” of cenotes in a circular way, that surrounds the shape of the crater.
All this white dots are a single “cenote” Well, when the meteorite fell to earth, all this part of America, and the Caribbean was under the sea. With the impact of the meteorite, it blows up a huge amount of rocks, is believed that meteorite was desintegrated before touching the ground. When it break through, the atmosphere was disintegrating, but the shock wave and the high speed creates a huge crater, the heat of the impact that the meteorite lift millions of tons of molten rock or lava into the atmosphere, (rocks of this zone. have been found in Asia, Canada and Europe All that stuff that arose and caused a large cloud of gas and dust Lava covered the planet for thousands of years, it is said that these clouds were so black that sky was covered for many years, inhibiting photosynthesis and cooling the ground. Which many of the dinosaurs, and reptiles, they could not keep their blood warm. It is even believed that life at sea was also mass extinctions, Because the acid rain. The material fell thousands and thousands of years were filling the large crater; layers upon layers created what is now Yucatan soil. Imagine a hive of rocks that cool quickly, like when you cook a cake. Large air cavities are hollow, while others are formed. The Yucatan soil is mainly limestone, very porous, when it rains, all the water seeps into these large deposits of water holes, creating an aquatic underworld of rivers and large lakes that are connected together, filtered by thick layers of limestone, you get very clean water for life. This ground is limestone, and isn´t very strong, so, these cavities tend to eroding for centuries of rain, then break down, exposing those big pits full of water. Some obviously remain covered by the soil, and were discovered by small caves or tunnels. Which can be accessed by small or large passages entries. The cenote that I´ve showed you in pictures, was a cave, that it´s roof was broken, exposing the crystal water whose emerging from underground rivers. Others like you’ve seen, are still roofed, and covered by soil. Some trees roots goes underground until touch the water deposits. There is about 3000 known cenotes, but underground must be much more undiscovered!
A cave but in this case there is no water, only the fallen roof
A roofed cenote, this one is very small just a flooded cavern
An open cenote, this is huge! is called “Zaci� Imagine the size of that cave when it was roofed.
You know this very well, I found more photos and you can see the tree is alive :D “X´lakah dzonot”
This is one of my favourites, it´s a closed one, and you´ll figure out what are in the center: the root of a tree reaching the water. Look at the pile of stone, that fell from the roof! It´s called: “Saak mul ha”
This is very close from the last one, also is a roofed cenote. It´s name is: X-keken