How to repeat an old catastrophe!

For many, the natural and geopark of Styrian Eisenwurzen is a natural jewel, where adventurous walks, mountain tours and exciting insights in the history of the earth are offered. For paleontologists such as Dr. However, Alexander Lukender from the Natural History Museum Vienna is much more: a geological archive in which chapters of the history of our earth, such as pages of an old book, can be opened.

With geologists Hamer, titanium fragment rod and gamma radiation device, Lukener follows the traces of a disaster that took place 233 million years ago-the so-called Carnic crisis. This global climate catastrophe is mentioned with dramatic consequences for life on earth according to the age of Karn (Carnium), which in turn takes its name from the Carnian Alps (Cartinthia), where rocks occur.

At that time, violent volcanic eruptions released on large quantities of CO₂ and Methangas, heated the climate and changed the chemical composition of the sea.

New animal groups emerged from the axis
This led to acidification, lack of oxygen and the extinction of a lot of life in the sea. But new animal groups came from the axis of this crisis – including the large dinosaurs, which then developed into a dominant species on the planet.

Nowadays Alexander analyzes a forest path in the area of the Austrian federal forest rot strokes, fossils and microscopic lime skeletons in Großreifling. His goal: to get a better understanding of how dramatically and quickly the climate of the earth can change – and what the traces leave behind.

Because there are clear indications of sudden changes in fauna in the rock strokes, abrupt changes in the sediments and the disappearance of entire ecosystems.

This time Man is the cause
“I am not a future researcher and not a climatologist,” says Lukener, “Today you can see such changes in marine sediments within 50 years, for which it was two million years.”

So what was once activated by the forces of nature happens again – only that we are the cause this time. Human climate change makes symptoms that are reminiscent of past crises, such as a rapid increase, acidification of the ocean, coral death, loss of species and an accelerated warming, as recently prevents in the history of the earth after super volcanic eruptions or meteorite stubs.

Paleontology as an early warning system
“The change in the climate itself is of course completely irrelevant for the earth itself,” the researcher explains soberly: “The impact of the meteor on the Yukatan peninsula in Mexico, who threw away the dinosaurs, did not interest the earth itself.”

The professor’s research, who also teaches at the University of Vienna, will be a kind of early warning system. “We are back in the middle of a new geological crisis,” says the resident of Upper Austria, who now lives with his family in the Vienna Wald.

“And the changes are just as in -depth as those in Trias 233 million years ago that this time people and modern civilization are affected. The Carnic Crisis and the Großreifling fossils therefore show how vulnerable the balance of the earth is and how brutal the consequences can be when this balance tilts.”