Sir David Attenborough’s team uncovers new evidence of dinosaurs’ last days on Earth

Sir David Attenborough has been working on a new documentary, Dinosaurs: The Final Day, which will air on BBC One next week

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Sir David Attenborough says new evidence of the last days of dinosaurs on Earth has been discovered while filming his new BBC documentary.

An asteroid – called Chicxulub – hit the planet about 66 million years ago and wiped out the dinosaurs.

And now, the fossil of one of the dinosaurs thought to have been killed by the giant comet has been discovered.

The preserved dinosaur foot was discovered while the 95-year-old natural historian and his crew explored the Tanis fossil site in North Dakota.

They were there for three years filming Dinosaurs: The Final Day, which included the investigation of the devastated asteroid.

A rock fragment of the meteorite was found in a fish fossil at the excavation site.

Attenborough and his team were given exclusive access and he said: “The film tells the story of the last day dinosaurs lived on Earth – and details every minute of that day.

“We tend to think that the end of a (geological) period lasts for decades, if not centuries, and indeed the end of a period can vary across around the world in different regions.”

However, he said that what was “remarkable” about the subject was that “it was an amazingly huge worldwide event.” He then commented on the asteroid itself.

He commented recently: “An object the size of Mount Everest has hit the Earth and that’s the end of the Cretaceous – and that’s an extraordinary thing that can happen.”

Attenborough said it was “extraordinary” to have caused the end of the dinosaurs, and he said their extinction prompted life on the planet to “start anew.”

He recalls the moment when tests showed that the chemical structure of the suspected rock matched that of the asteroid. It was a “moment that justifies a thing in the moment,” he said.

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The broadcaster – who is currently covering the Dy Kingdoms II series – says that the information gleaned from the scientists’ work made the extinction event “really very vivid.”

The natural historian further commented that it was “extraordinary” to hold the sphere in hand knowing that it had fallen “within hours of the meteorite impact.”

He said it was proof of the event that caused 75% of the species on the planet to disappear, indicating that his heart beat especially fast when he held it.

It is understood that the special effects will take him back in time to the late Cretaceous, before recreating the events of the last days of the dinosaurs.

Attenborough, paleontologist Robert DePalma and BBC Studios have been exploring the Tanis fossil site for more than three years.

Dinosaurs: The Final Day will air on BBC One next Friday (April 15).

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