Time Line of the Universe

 

27,800,000 BP:  A major eruption of a caldera forms the Fish Canyon Tuff, in the San Juan Mountains of what will become Colorado.  October 25, 2005
3,000,000 BP:  Horses enter into South America via the isthmus of Panama.  October 10, 2005  
2,200,000 BP:  The Yellowstone Caldera erupts, forming the Huckleberry Ridge Tuff.  October 25, 2005  
840,000 BP:  A major eruption of the Toba Caldera.  October 25, 2005  
700,000 BP:  A major eruption of the Toba Caldera.  October 25, 2005  
600,000 BP:  The Yellowstone Caldera erupts, forming the Lava Creek Tuff.  October 25, 2005  
80,000 BP: The ancestors of all non-African peoples are believed to have migrated from Africa as a single population.  October 25, 2005  
74,000 BP:  The Toba Caldera erupts in its most recent explosion, spewing out 2,800 cubic kilometers of material, and thus forming the Young Toba Tuff.  This eruption is believed to have caused a genetic bottleneck in Humans, due to the resulting extreme climatic conditions.  October 25, 2005  
71,000 BP:  The documented time of the Human genetic bottleneck, believed to have been caused by the Toba eruption.  The Human population in the world is thought to have fallen to as few as 15,000 individuals.  In short, Humans nearly became extinct.  October 25, 2005  
14,000 BP:  The melting of an Antarctic ice sheet, which possibly triggered  a period of warming in Europe, called the Bølling-Allerød warm interval, and which marked the end of the last ice age.  May 29, 2005  
13,000 BP:  The Younger Dryas cold interval begins, probably caused by the influx of fresh water into the north Atlantic Ocean, which caused the shut down of the oceanic conveyor belt, halting the circulation of warmer waters.  May 29, 2005  
12,000 BP:  The earliest accepted time frame for the migration of modern Humans into North America.  It is conventionally thought that these people arrived via the Bering Land Bridge, and then slowly spread throughout both North and South America.  Sea going settlers may have settled North America at earlier dates, but scientific opinion on this remains divided.  May 22, 2005  
11,000 BP:  Perak Man dies in a cave in Malaysia.  He will become the only known complete example of a Paleolithic man in Malaysia.  October 25, 2005  
10,000 BP:  Major extinctions in North and South America occur at the end of the last ice age.  While everything from Human hunting to climate change has been blamed, the true cause of the extinctions remains unknown.  October 10, 2005  
6,000 BP:  Aside from minor, local changes due to storm, geological, or other activity, the continents and their coasts are largely configured as they are today.  May 22, 2005  
~1500 AC:  The first horses are brought to North America by Spanish explorers.  This marks the return of a species that had actually evolved in North America, but died out towards the end of the last ice age.  October 10, 2005  
1980 AC:  Mount Saint Helens erupts.  October 25, 2005  

 

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Page design and designated graphics © John M. Dollan 2005
This Page first uploaded May 22, 2005
Most recent update for this page October 25, 2005