Antarctica Was a Warm Swampy Place at One Time

It seems that all we have been hearing about of late is COVID-19.  We honestly don't know if the world is going to sink into a deep, dark depression or if The Fed is going to start handing out "free" money and inflate the whole system again.  Thankfully God is still on the throne and we have an eternal home with Him regardless of what happens.

So here is some interesting news that has nothing to do with COVID-19.

It would appear that researchers have discovered that Antarctica wasn't always covered with massive amounts of ice.

It’s hard to imagine Antarctica as anything other than a freezing lifeless landscape, but that wasn’t always the case. Now, an international team has recovered a 90-million-year old soil sample that paints the most detailed picture of ancient Antarctica ever found, revealing a swampy rainforest and balmy temperatures.

According to the study, during the peak of the Age of the Dinosaurs, West Antarctica was covered in dense vegetation, rivers and swamps. The annual average air temperature was around 12 °C (53.6 °F), and during summer that average went up to a pleasant 19 °C (66.2 °F). Rainfall amounts and intensity were similar to the lowlands of places like Wales.

The researchers made this startling discovery by studying a sediment core drilled from deep beneath the ocean floor, in the Amundsen Sea off the west coast of Antarctica. A certain section appeared to be extremely well-preserved forest soil.

“During the initial shipboard assessments, the unusual coloration of the sediment layer quickly caught our attention; it clearly differed from the layers above it,” says Johann Klages, first author of the study. “Moreover, the first analyses indicated that, at a depth of 27 to 30 m (88.6 to 98.4 ft) below the ocean floor, we had found a layer originally formed on land, not in the ocean.”

When they studied this layer with X-ray CT scans, the researchers found a remarkably intact sample of an ancient forest floor. The soil was made up of fine-grained silt and clay, with individual cell structures visible. Pollen and spores from plants were found throughout, including the first evidence of flowering plants in Antarctica. And most impressively, a network of tree roots twisted their way through the whole sample.

“The numerous plant remains indicate that 93 to 83 million years ago the coast of West Antarctica was a swampy landscape in which temperate rainforests grew – similar to the forests that can still be found, say, on New Zealand’s South Island,” says Ulrich Salzmann, co-author of the study.

Here;  https://newatlas.com/environment/ancient-antarctica-sediment-warm-rainforest/?utm_source=New+Atlas+Subscribers&utm_campaign=61b40277d4-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2020_04_02_01_52&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_65b67362bd-61b40277d4-91888189

We have no idea if this all happened 90 million years ago, as they say, or if maybe it was this way BEFORE NOAH'S FLOOD.

But we do know that this has to be kind of a bummer for the "Man-made global warming" folks.  Since there were no men driving cars and burning coal 90.000.000 years ago, I wonder WHO caused the earth to be so warm that Antarctica was a swamp?