Tanis (fossil site)

Tanis is the name given to a site of paleontological interest in

Tanis
southwestern North Dakota, United States.[1] Tanis is part of the
heavily studied Hell Creek Formation, a group of rocks spanning Stratigraphic range: 65.76 +/-
four states in North America renowned for many significant fossil 0.15 MYa
discoveries from the Upper Cretaceous and lower Paleocene. Tanis
is an extraordinary and unique site because it appears to record the
events from the first minutes until a few hours after the impact of
the giant Chicxulub asteroid in extreme detail. This impact, which
struck the Gulf of Mexico 66 million years ago, wiped out all non-
avian dinosaurs and many other species (the so-called "K-Pg" or
"K-T" extinction). The extinction event caused by this impact 'Tanis' fossil site, taken from
paved the way for the domination of the Earth by mammals, DePalma et al 2019.
including human beings.
Type Geological formation
The site was originally discovered in 2008 by University of North Unit of Montana GroupTO
Georgia Professor Steve Nicklas and field paleontologist Rob CHECK AND UPDATE –
Sula. Their team successfully removed fossil field jackets that COPIED FROM HELL
contained articulated sturgeons, paddlefish, and bowfins. These CREEK FOR NOW
fossils were delivered for research to the Field Museum of Natural
History in Chicago. Recognizing the unique nature of the site, Underlies Fort Union
Nicklas and Sula brought in Robert DePalma, a University of FormationTO CHECK
Kansas graduate student, to perform additional excavations. The AND UPDATE – COPIED

site was systematically excavated by Robert DePalma over several FROM HELL CREEK FOR
years beginning in 2012, working in near-total secrecy.[2]: pg.11 NOW
Key findings were presented in two conference papers in October
Overlies Fox Hills FormationTO
2017.[3][4] The full paper introducing Tanis was widely covered in CHECK AND UPDATE –
worldwide media on 29 March 2019, in advance of its official
COPIED FROM HELL
publication three days later. The co-authors included Walter
CREEK FOR NOW
Alvarez and Jan Smit, both renowned experts on the K-Pg impact
and extinction. Other papers describing the site and its fossils are in Thickness 1.3m
progress.
Lithology
At Tanis, unlike any other known Lagerstätte site, it appears freak Primary Claystone,
circumstances allowed for the preservation of exquisite, moment- mudstoneTO CHECK AND
by-moment details caused by the impact event. These include UPDATE – COPIED FROM
many rare and unique finds, which allow unprecedented HELL CREEK FOR NOW
examination of the direct effects of the impact on plants and
animals alive at the time of the large bolide impact some 3,000 Other Sandstone, siltstone,
kilometers (1,900 mi) distant. The events at Tanis occurred far too conglomerate,
soon after impact to be caused by the megatsunamis expected from amberTO CHECK AND
any large impact near large bodies of water. Instead, much faster UPDATE – COPIED FROM
seismic waves from the massive magnitude 10 – 11.5 HELL CREEK FOR NOW
earthquakes[1]: p.8 probably reached the Hell Creek area as soon as
Location
ten minutes after the impact, creating seiche waves between 10–
100 metres (33–328 ft) high in the Western Interior Seaway [1]: p.8 Region south-west North
and perhaps in other waters nearer Tanis, which was near an Dakota, within the Hell
ancient river. These waves carried sea, land, freshwater animals Creek Formation
and plants, and other debris several miles inland. The seiche waves Country United States
exposed and covered the site twice, as millions of tiny droplets and
debris from the impact were arriving on ballistic trajectories from Type section
their source in what is now the Yucatán Peninsula. Named for Tanis, Ancient Egypt

As of April 2019, reported findings include: Named by Robert DePalma

animals and plant material preserved in

three-dimensional detail and at times
upright, rather than pressed flat as usual,
their remains thrown together by the massive
wave movements
articulated and cartilaginous salt and
freshwater fish and marine reptiles found
together miles inland, with many
microtektites (molten debris particles from
the impact) embedded in their gills as they
tried to breathe
millions of "near perfect" primary (that is, not
reworked) microtektites "almost This fossil fish from Tanis shows microtektites
indistinguishable" in chemical composition (molten splattered glass droplets) that are a
from previously-reported Chicxulub tektites chemical match for ejecta from the Chicxulub
found buried contemporaneous to the fossils asteroid crater. The microtektites are concentrated
in their own impact holes in the soft riverbed in large numbers in the gill rakers of approximately
mud, and also preserved in amber on tree- 50% of the sturgeon and paddlefish fossils, and
trunks show that the fish were alive when the impact
large primitive feathers 30–40 cm long with occurred.
3.5 mm quills believed to come from large
dinosaurs
broken remains from almost all known Hell Creek dinosaur groups

and some incredibly rare finds, such as:

fossils of hatchlings and intact eggs with embryo fossils

fossil pterosaurs for which no other fossils exist at that time
drowned ant nests with ants inside and chambers filled with asteroid debris, and
tiny inhabited burrows from some of the first mammals in the area after the impact

The hundreds of fish remains are distributed by size, and generally show evidence of tetany (a body posture
related to suffocation in fish), suggesting strongly that they were all killed indiscriminately by a common
suffocating cause that affected the entire population. Fragile remains spanning the layers of debris show that
the site was laid down in a single event over a short timespan. A Triceratops or other ceratopsian ilium (hip
bone) was found at the high water mark, in circumstances hinting that the dinosaur might speculatively
have been a floating carcass and possibly alive at or just before impact,[5] but the paper describing such
remains is still in progress as of 2019[6] – the initial papers only include a photograph and its location
within Tanis.[2]: figure S29 pg.53

The exceptional nature of the findings and conclusions have led some scientists to await further scrutiny by
the scientific community before agreeing that the discoveries at Tanis have been correctly understood.[7]
The site continues to be explored.
Contents
Background
The K-Pg extinction event
Hell Creek Formation
Robert DePalma
Discovery and exploration of 'Tanis'
PNAS Paper published in 2019
Initial papers at GSA Conference, 2017
Prepublication and authorship
Notes
References

Background

The K-Pg extinction event

The Cretaceous–Paleogene
("K-Pg" or "K-T") extinction
event around 66 million years
ago wiped out all non-avian
dinosaurs and many other
species. Proposed by Luis and
Walter Alvarez, it is now
widely accepted that the Tanis Tanis
(approx.) (approx.)
extinction was caused by a
huge asteroid or bolide that
impacted Earth in the shallow
seas of the Gulf of Mexico, Chicxulub
crater
leaving behind the Chicxulub
crater.[8][9] The impactor tore Chicxulub
crater
through the earth's crust,
creating huge earthquakes, Location of Tanis and of the Chicxulub crater
Left: present day, Right: at impact 65 million years ago
giant waves, and a crater 180
kilometers (112 mi) wide, and
blasted aloft trillions of tons of dust, debris, and climate-changing sulfates from the gypsum seabed, and it
may have created firestorms worldwide. With the exception of some ectothermic species such as the
leatherback sea turtle and crocodiles, no tetrapods weighing more than 25 kilograms (55 lb) survived.[10] It
marked the end of the Cretaceous period and the Mesozoic Era, opening the Cenozoic Era that continues
today.

However, because it is rare in any case for animals and plants to be fossilized, the fossil record leaves some
major questions unanswered. One of these is whether dinosaurs were already declining at the time of the
event due to ongoing volcanic climate change. Also, there is little evidence on the detailed effects of the
event on Earth and its biosphere. No fossil beds were yet known that could clearly show the details that
might resolve these questions. There is considerable detail for times greater than hundreds of thousands of
years either side of the event, and for certain kinds of change on
either side of the K-Pg boundary layer. But relatively little fossil
evidence is available from times nearer the crucial event, a
difficulty known as the "Three metre problem".

Hell Creek Formation

The Hell Creek Formation is a well-known and much-studied

fossil-bearing formation (geological region) of mostly Upper
Cretaceous and some lower Paleocene rock, that stretches across
portions of Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Wyoming K-Pg boundary sample from
Wyoming. The intermediate
in North America. The formation is named for early studies at Hell
claystone layer contains 1000 times
Creek, located near Jordan, Montana, and it was designated as a
more iridium than the upper and
National Natural Landmark in 1966.[11] lower layers (San Diego Natural
History Museum).
The formation contains a series of fresh and brackish-water clays,
mudstones, and sandstones deposited during the Maastrichtian and
Danian (respectively, the end of the Cretaceous and the beginning
of the Paleogene periods) by fluvial activity in fluctuating river channels and deltas and very occasional
peaty swamp deposits along the low-lying eastern continental margin fronting the late Cretaceous Western
Interior Seaway. The iridium-enriched Cretaceous–Paleogene boundary, which separates the Cretaceous
from the Cenozoic, is distinctly visible as a discontinuous thin marker above and occasionally within the
formation. Numerous famous fossils of plants and animals, including many types of dinosaur fossils, have
been discovered there.

At the time of the Chicxulub impact, the present-day North American continent was still forming. Most of
central North America had recently been a large shallow seaway, called the Western Interior Seaway (also
known as the North American Sea or the Western Interior Sea), and parts were still submerged. This had
initially been a seaway between separate continents, but it had narrowed in the late Cretaceous to become,
in effect, a large inland extension to the Gulf of Mexico. The Hell Creek Formation was at this time very
low-lying or partly submerged land at the northern end of the seaway, and the Chicxulub impact occurred
in the shallow seas at the southern end, approximately 3,050 km (1,900 mi) from the site.[1]: p.8

Although Tanis and Chicxulub were connected by the remaining Interior Seaway, the massive water waves
from the impact area were probably not responsible for the deposits at Tanis. Any water-borne waves
would have arrived between 18 and 26 hours later,[2]: p.24 long after the microtektites had already fallen
back to earth, and far too late to leave the geological record found at the site. It is not even clear whether the
massive waves were able to traverse the entire Interior Seaway.[1]: p.8 Instead, the initial papers on Tanis
conclude that much faster earthquake waves, the primary waves travelling through rock at about 5 km/s
(11,000 mph),[1]: p.8 probably reached Hell Creek within six minutes, and quickly caused massive water
surges known as seiches in the shallow waters close to Tanis.[1]: p.8 Seiche waves often occur shortly after
significant earthquakes, even thousands of miles away, and can be sudden and violent. Some recent
examples include the 1964 Alaskan earthquake (seiches in Puerto Rico),[12] the 1950 Assam-Tibet
earthquake (India/China) (seiches in England and Norway), the 2010 Chile earthquake (seiches in
Louisiana). Notably, the powerful magnitude 9.0 – 9.1 Tōhoku earthquake in 2011, slower secondary
waves traveled over 8,000 km (5,000 mi) in less than 30 minutes to cause seiches around 1.5–1.8 m (4.9–
5.9 ft) high in Norway.[13][1]: p.8

The Chicxulub impact is believed to have triggered earthquakes estimated at magnitude 10 – 11.5,[1]: p.8
releasing up to 4000 times the energy of the Tohoku quake.[note 1] Co-author Mark Richards, a professor of
earth sciences focusing on dynamic earth crust processes[14] suggests that the resulting seiche waves would
have been approximately 10–100 metres (33–328 ft) high in the Western Interior Seaway near Tanis[1]: p.8
and credibly, could have created the 10 – 11 m (33 – 36 feet) high water movements evidenced inland at
the site; the time taken by the seismic waves to reach the region and cause earthquakes almost exactly
matched the flight time of the microtektites found at the site.[15] This would resolve conflicting evidence
that huge water movements had occurred in the Hell Creek region near Tanis much less than an hour after
impact, although the first megatsunamis from the impact zone could not have arrived at the site for almost a
full day.

Robert DePalma

Robert DePalma is a lifelong paleontologist with an M.A. in geology,[16] the curator of vertebrate
paleontology at the Palm Beach Museum of Natural History,[16] and a doctoral student[15] in paleontology
at the University of Kansas.[5] He has published several discoveries,[16] including a 2010 paper presenting
the first known amber-trapped insect fossils from Hell Creek,[17] and a 2013 paper presenting a tyrannosaur
tooth embedded in a hadrosaur tail, showing that tyrannosaurs were indeed hunters rather than pure
scavengers – a controversy at the time.[5][18] On the other hand, a published paper was criticized in 2015
and corrected in 2016, after other scientists noticed that in his reconstruction of a new species he called
Dakotaraptor, he had accidentally included turtle entoplastron (armour) fragments in error, taking them to
be part of the fossilized furculum.[19][20][5] As a result, some paleontologists felt that he might be prone to
"over-interpret".[5]

Co-author Professor Phillip Manning, a specialist in fossil soft tissues,[21] described DePalma's working
techniques at Tanis as "meticulous" and "borderline archaeological in his excavation approach".[7] His
work with the 2013 tyrannosaur-hadrosaur specimen was similarly characterized as "meticulous" and
"archeological" by the vertebrate paleontology department of the University of Kansas on its website.[22]

In 2004, DePalma was studying a small site in the well-known Hell Creek Formation, containing numerous
layers of thin sediment, creating a geological record of great detail. His advisor suggested seeking a similar
site, closer to the K-Pg boundary layer.[5] The original discoverers of the site (Rob Sula and Steve Nicklas),
who worked the site for several years, recognized its scientific importance and offered it to DePalma as he
had some previous experience with working on fish sites. The site lacked the fine sediment layers he was
initially looking for. Instead, the layers had never fully solidified, the fossils at the site were fragile, and
everything appeared to have been laid down in a single large flood.[5]

Discovery and exploration of 'Tanis'

DePalma began excavating systematically in 2012[2]: 11 and quickly found the site to contain very unusual
and promising features. Everything he found had been covered so quickly that details were exceptionally
well preserved, and the fossils as a whole formed a very unusual collection – fish fins and complete fish,
tree trunks with amber, fossils in upright rather than squashed flat positions, hundreds or thousands of
cartilaginous fully articulated freshwater paddlefish, sturgeon and even saltwater mosasaurs which had
ended up on the same mudbank miles inland (only about four fossilized fish were previously known from
the entire Hell Creek formation), fragile body parts such as complete and intact tails, ripped from the
seafish's bodies and preserved inland in a manner that suggested they were covered almost immediately
after death, and – everywhere – millions of tiny spheres of glassy material known as microtektites, the result
of tiny splatters of molten material reaching the ground.[5] The microtektites were present and concentrated
in the gills of about 50% of the fossilized fish, in amber, and buried in the small pits in the mud which they
had made when they contemporaneously impacted.[5] The fish were not bottom feeders. They had breathed
in early debris that fell into water, in the
seconds or minutes before death.[23] The
sediment appeared to have liquefied and
covered the deposited biota, then quickly
solidified, preserving much of the contents in
three dimensions.[23]

Later discoveries included large primitive

feathers 30–40 cm long with 3.5 mm quills
believed to come from large dinosaurs; broken
remains from almost all known Hell Creek
dinosaur groups, including some incredibly
rare hatchling and intact egg with embryo
fossils; fossil pterosaurs for which no other
fossils exist at that time; drowned ant nests
with ants inside and chambers filled with
asteroid debris; and burrows of small
mammals living at the site immediately after
the impact.[5] Analysis of early samples Tanis location, schematic layout, and photo, showing:
showed that the microtektites at Tanis were (1) Impact event deposits, covering (2) the slope of a
prograding point bar of a river meander (bend). (3) Densest
almost identical to those found at the Mexican
accumulations of fossil carcasses. (4) K-Pg boundary
impact site, and were likely to be primary
tonstein which directly overlays the impact deposit, and (5)
deposits (directly from the impact) and not
directly overlays the adjacent river overbank. (6) location of
reworked (moved from their original location Brooke Butte, the closest K-Pg outcrop to Tanis.
by later geological processes).[1]
Inset: Tanis at time of impact. The site is some
DePalma quickly began to suspect that he had
miles from a large inland sea connected to the
stumbled upon a monumentally important and Gulf of Mexico.
unique site – not just "near" the K-Pg
boundary, but a unique killing field that From DePalma et al. 2019
precisely captured the first minutes and hours
after impact, when the K-Pg boundary was
created, along with an unprecedented fossil
record of creatures and plants that died on that day, as well as material directly from the impact itself, in
circumstances that allowed exceptional preservation.

When I saw [microtektites in their own impact craters], I knew this wasn’t just any flood
deposit. We weren’t just near the KT boundary. This whole site is the KT boundary ... We
have the whole KT event preserved in these sediments. With this deposit, we can chart what
happened the day the Cretaceous died.

— Robert DePalma[5]

It is truly a magnificent site ... surely one of the best sites ever found for telling just what
happened on the day of the impact.

— Walter Alvarez[5]

By 2013, he was still studying the site, which he named "Tanis" after the ancient Egyptian city of the same
name,[5] and had told only three close colleagues about it.[5] Secrecy about Tanis was maintained until
disclosed by DePalma and co-author Jan Smit in two short summary papers presented in October
2017,[3][4] which remained the only public information before widespread media coverage of the full
prepublication paper on 29 March 2019.[24]

PNAS Paper published in 2019

Initial papers at GSA Conference, 2017

Eighteen months before publication of the peer-reviewed PNAS paper in 2019 [1] DePalma and his
colleagues presented two conference papers on fossil finds at Tanis on 23 October 2017 at the annual
meeting of the Geological Society of America. Jan Smit first presented a paper describing the Tanis site, its
association with the K-Pg boundary event and associated fossil discoveries, including the presence of glass
spherules from the Chicxulub impact clustered in the gill rakers of acipenciform fishes and also found in
amber.[4] DePalma then presented a paper describing excavation of a burrow created by a small mammal
that had been made "immediately following the K-Pg impact" at Tanis.[3]

Prepublication and authorship

A paper documenting Tanis was released as a prepublication on 1 April 2019.[1] Simultaneous media
disclosure had been intended via the New Yorker, but the magazine learned that a rival newspaper had
heard about the story, and asked permission to publish early to avoid being scooped by waiting until the
paper was published.[25] The discovery received widespread media coverage from 29 March 2019.[26]

DePalma's co-authors include Jan Smit (retired paleontologist and world authority[27][28][5] on the K-Pg
impact and its tektites) and Walter Alvarez (professor, recipient of numerous prestigious awards, and co-
developer with his Nobel Laureate father of the K-Pg impact theory, sometimes called the Alvarez
hypothesis). Other authors are his advisor David Burnham, Klaudia Kuiper (professor of geochronology
focusing on chronology of the late Cretaceous [29]), Phillip Manning (professor of natural sciences,
specialist in soft tissue scanning [21]), Anton Oleinik (associate professor geosciences, specializing in
Cenozoic periods of change and stratigraphy [30]), Peter Larson (paleontologist and fossil collector),
Florentin Maurrasse (professor specializing in stratigraphy and biostratigraphy, and the K-Pg boundary in
the Caribbean [31]), Johan Vellekoop (postdoctoral researcher, published on microfossil record of the
Chicxulub impactor[32]), Mark Richards (professor earth and planetary sciences, focus on earth crust
tectonic and dynamic processes[14]), and Loren Gurche (a colleague at the Palm Beach Museum of Natural
History). A wide range of other people are credited with analysis, specific studies, and other contributions.

As of April 2019, several other papers are in preparation, with further papers anticipated by DePalma and
co-authors, and some by visiting researchers.[33]

Notes
1. If two earthquakes have moment magnitudes M1 and M2, then the energy released by the
second earthquake is about 101.5 x (M2 – M1) times as much at the first. (Formula and details)
The 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami was estimated at magnitude 9.1, so the energy
released by the Chicxulub earthquakes, estimated at up to magnitude 11.5, may have been
up to 101.5 x (11.5 – 9.1) = 3981 times larger. The 1960 Valdivia Chile earthquake was the
most powerful ever recorded, estimated at magnitude 9.4 to 9.6. Using the same formula, the
Chicxulub earthquakes may have released up to 1412 times as much energy as the Chile
event.
References
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Oleinik, Anton; Larson, Peter; Maurrasse, Florentin J.; Vellekoop, Johan; Richards, Mark A.;
Gurche, Loren; Alvarez, Walter (2019). "A seismically induced onshore surge deposit at the
KPG boundary, North Dakota" (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6486721).
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 116 (17): 8190–8199.
Bibcode:2019PNAS..116.8190D
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24. "Google News search 'Robert DePalma fossil' before 2019-03-28" (https://www.google.com/
search?q=Robert+DePalma+fossil). 28 March 2019. Retrieved 9 April 2019.
25. Marshall, Michael (1 April 2019). "Incredible fossil find may be first victims of dino-killer
asteroid" (https://www.newscientist.com/article/2198347-incredible-fossil-find-may-be-first-vi
ctims-of-dino-killer-asteroid). New Scientist. Retrieved 9 April 2019.
26. "Google News search 'Robert DePalma fossil' 27-03 to 29–03 2019" (https://www.google.co
m/search?q=Robert+DePalma+fossil). Retrieved 9 April 2019.
27. https://www.washington.edu/news/2019/03/29/north-dakota-site-shows-wreckage-from-
same-object-that-killed-the-dinosaurs – "Jan Smit ... who is considered the world expert on
tektites from the impact, analyzed and dated the tektites from the Tanis site."
28. https://web.archive.org/web/20150207173038/http://www.dinosaurus.net/portret/smit.htm :
Smit, die is verbonden aan de Vrije universiteit van Amsterdam, wordt door Alvarez
omschreven als een K-T expert. "Jan heeft meer K-T vindplaatsen over de gehele wereld
bestudeerd dan alle anderen. ('Smit, who is affiliated with the Free University of Amsterdam,
is described by Alvarez as a KT expert: "Jan has studied more KT sites around the world
than anyone else" ' – translated from original Dutch)
29. "Klaudia Kuiper academic profile" (https://www.geo.vu.nl/~sedimar/Site/klaudia_kuiper.html).
Department of Earth Sciences, Vrije University ("VU"), Amsterdam, Netherlands. 11 October
2012. Retrieved 9 April 2019.
30. "Anton Oleinik academic profile" (http://www.geosciences.fau.edu/people/oleinik.php).
Department of Geosciences, Florida Atlantic University. Retrieved 9 April 2019.
31. College of Arts, Sciences & Education. "Florentin Maurrasse academic profile" (https://case.f
iu.edu/about/directory/people/maurrass.html). Florida International University. Retrieved
9 April 2019.
32. "Johan Vellekoop academic profile" (https://ees.kuleuven.be/staff/index.html?intranet=u0101
889). Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, Catholic University of Leuven ("KU
Leuven"), Belgium. Retrieved 9 April 2019.
33. – Robert DePalma voice interview with Jason Spiess on the 'Crude Life Content Network'
channel (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FLNApH7IYn8?t=640), YouTube, at
time 10m 40s. Uploaded on YouTube 2019-04-02

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