The most likely culprit would be what I call cataclysmic continental shift.
This has occurred multiple times throughout earth's history. It's a naturally occurring phenomenon and is built-in as part of the inner workings of our ever-changing planet.
If you want to know what causes them, read: Cataclysmic Continental Shifts: What Causes Them?
Most of our planet's history consists of long periods of relative calm, where the continents are almost static or drift very slowly as the tectonic plates spread apart in some areas and subduct in others. During these periods of calm, the forces that cause change in the landscape - erosion, mountain building, flooding, earthquakes, volcanism - are comparatively slow and insignificant. Insignificant compared to how drastically things change during a shift.
A shift occurs when the conditions are right, seismic activity increases and a critical point is reached. Then all hell breaks loose. The tectonic plates shift violently. The volcanic activity at the plate boundaries darken the skies and poison the seas. The earth's crust buckles, adding height to mountain ranges and creating new valleys. Continents partially sink and ocean floors rise - forcing ocean water and silt over the land masses. The mid-oceanic ridges grow rapidly in some places and parts of the contnental plates subduct violently in others. Polar ice caps break apart and add to the chaos.
The earthquakes, volcanism, toxic rain and widespread flooding kill the majority of our planet's species both in the oceans and on land. The plants and animals alive at the time might get caught in one of the massive silt-laden floods where they will be rapidly buried and eventually be preserved as fossils. Read: How Fossils Are Really Formed
A shift occurs when the conditions are right, seismic activity increases and a critical point is reached. Then all hell breaks loose. The tectonic plates shift violently. The volcanic activity at the plate boundaries darken the skies and poison the seas. The earth's crust buckles, adding height to mountain ranges and creating new valleys. Continents partially sink and ocean floors rise - forcing ocean water and silt over the land masses. The mid-oceanic ridges grow rapidly in some places and parts of the contnental plates subduct violently in others. Polar ice caps break apart and add to the chaos.
The earthquakes, volcanism, toxic rain and widespread flooding kill the majority of our planet's species both in the oceans and on land. The plants and animals alive at the time might get caught in one of the massive silt-laden floods where they will be rapidly buried and eventually be preserved as fossils. Read: How Fossils Are Really Formed
Learn more about how continental shift explains missing links and punctuated equilibrium by reading this post: Punctuated Equilibrium: What Causes It?
There is plenty of geological evidence of each and every one of these catastrophes. Our planet's surface is like an open book. For example, the various strata in the rocks and the worldwide upheavals that expose them is just one place to see the evidence of periodic cataclysms. Learn more about this concept by reading: Unconformities Are Clues to Cataclysmic Extinction Events.
The most recent one took place somewhere between 3000 BC and 10,000 BC and is associated in history with the great Deluge of Noah and the other flood myths of almost every culture on the planet.
It is the only worldwide shift that happened during human history. The rest occurred long before man was on the earth. Read: Science and Religion: Both Dating Methods Are Wrong
This is the catastrophe that caused the extinction of the "ice age" megafauna. Those are sarcastic quotes, by the way, because the "ice age" is one of the most misunderstood aspects of our planet's history. Read more about that in this post: The Last Ice Age Was Really Just the Ice Cap In a Different Position.
The myth of Atlantis also stems from this same event. However, it wasn't just one mysterious continent that sunk. The pre-flood culture was world-wide and ALL the continents sank - later rising in different positions. Read more about it in this post: Atlantis Found: The Simple Answer Is the Best Answer. As well as the explanation of a global Atlantis culture in this post: Why Did the Pre-Flood Civilization Build Megalithic?
It is the only worldwide shift that happened during human history. The rest occurred long before man was on the earth. Read: Science and Religion: Both Dating Methods Are Wrong
This is the catastrophe that caused the extinction of the "ice age" megafauna. Those are sarcastic quotes, by the way, because the "ice age" is one of the most misunderstood aspects of our planet's history. Read more about that in this post: The Last Ice Age Was Really Just the Ice Cap In a Different Position.
The myth of Atlantis also stems from this same event. However, it wasn't just one mysterious continent that sunk. The pre-flood culture was world-wide and ALL the continents sank - later rising in different positions. Read more about it in this post: Atlantis Found: The Simple Answer Is the Best Answer. As well as the explanation of a global Atlantis culture in this post: Why Did the Pre-Flood Civilization Build Megalithic?
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| After the shift, landmasses which were previously habitable re-emerged in the Arctic and Antarctic. The ice caps reformed in new positions. |
Compare the devastation of the 1980 eruption of Mt. Saint Helen, and it's melting ice cap, to how much worse it would have been in the northern parts of the western hemisphere. The Scablands of Washington state and and a similar dry falls in Iceland, called Asbyrgi Canyon, are both evidence of the devastation during that event.
The North American and Eurasian plates spread apart rapidly - adding a distance of thousands of miles between the two coasts that previously had not existed.
During this violent shift, the sea floors rose temporarily while the continents sunk. The flood waters and volcanic activity caused the polar ice cap to break apart with ice melt and drifting ice sheets adding to the chaos.
One body of evidence for this is that the mid-Atlantic ridge's lava fields are very young, geologically speaking. The silt on the ocean floor and along the foothills of the ridge are only about 100 meters thick where the seafloors in other areas of the planet have 1000s of meters of sediment. This would also make Iceland a brand new island, forming on the mid-Atlantic ridge within that last 10,000 years. (Again, the "proof" that geologists use to claim it's older is flawed - they force the evidence to fit their pre-conceived conclusions.)
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| Area where evidence of a comet strike has been found. But this could instead be evidence of catastrophic volcanism at the mid-Atlantic ridge. |
It's possible that a comet or meteor strike can trigger or exasperate a shift. But most of the time it doesn't need that impetus. Our planet will reach the point of no return on its own.
Some scientists believe a comet strike was the cause of the demise of pre-Egyptian (pre-flood) civilizations at what they call the Younger Dryas Boundary (YDB). This event coincides with the most recent shift. They believe Canada was ground zero for a meteor or comet strike.
That evidence includes impact spherules, nano diamonds, soot and high-temperature melt-glass. There is also a layer of iridium - the same evidence found at the K-T layer which is associated with the theory of an earlier comet strike that caused the pre-historic demise of the dinosaurs.
The jury is out on the comet because these same clues would be present after a super volcano's eruption. And the rifting apart of two tectonic plates would be considered a super duper volcano. You would expect to find the same evidence as a comet strike, and in the same area outlined in the image above because the most violent activity was between the North American and European plates.
I'm hesitant to accept the comet theory because I find the odds extremely high for two comets being the culprit of two back to back global extinction events. However, one aspect does make it seem plausible. And that is that these two separate extinction events - that of the dinosaurs and that of the "ice age" megafauna (or Noah's flood) - appear to be two of the biggest extinction events in our planet's history.
Maybe the addition of comets are what put them at the top of the list - making them many, many times worse than a simple continental shift.
This entire blog is dedicated to expanding this idea, so check out all of the posts. Including this one about when the next shift will occur: The Next Big Cataclysm - Is a Shift on the Way?
Alternate Map
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| Another possible view of the continents' positions, prior to the most recent shift. All the land masses would have been further north. The previous North Pole would have been somewhere in northern Greenland or Canada. The ice cap would have extended into North America and Europe with Siberia, Alaska and Antarctica being ice free. Source |
Sources:
D. S. Allan and J. B. Delair, Cataclysm!: Compelling Evidence of a Cosmic Catastrophe in 9500 B.C. (Santa Fe: Bear & Co., 1995)
Graham Hancock, Magicians of the Gods (New York, 2015)
Additional reading:
