Impact at the Permo-Triassic Boundary: A Critical Evaluation

The recognition in 1980 of a signature of an extraterrestrial impact at the Cretaceous-Tertiary boundary and its apparent involvement with the mass extinction generated considerable enthusiasm for impacts at other mass extinctions. Numerous claims of impact evidence for the Permo-Triassic mass extinction (251.6 Ma), the largest of the Phanerozoic mass extinctions, have generally been rejected, found wanting, or been difficult to reproduce. Despite this lack of repeatable support, considerable available evidence is consistent with an impact, including the rapidity of extinction, coincident carbon shift, and evident correlation between terrestrial and marine extinctions. However attractive the hypothesis, the coincidence with the Siberian flood basalts and the complex nature of the carbon shift are in conflict with an impact. The most intriguing possibility is that the greatest mass extinction of the Phanerozoic left signals very similar to the end-Cretaceous mass extinction but was produced by entirely Earth-bound processes. If true, this would tell us far more about the nature of ecosystems and how they fail than would identification of another impact.