The appearance of the Earth as we know it, the layout of the continents and oceans, is actually relatively new. The land and seas of Eurasia, America, Africa, Antarctica, and Oceania that we see today are the product of vast tectonic plates placed in a similar way. But these puzzle pieces are moving, albeit very slowly. It is not possible to realize this in a human lifetime, but if we go back on the scale of millions of years, Earth’s landmass can make it seem like a completely different planet to us.
With the help of plate tectonics data and paleogeographic maps from CRScotese from the PALEOMAP Project, a new app has been created by former Google engineer Ian Webster that allows us to go back in time and take a look at what the Earth looked like millions of years ago.
The web application opens with a view of our planet from 240 million years ago in the age of the Pangea supercontinent, but you also have the option to choose views from 750 million years ago to the present day. For desktop users, if you hold down the left and right keys on the keyboard, you can even watch the continents crumble and eventually form the shape we know today.
You can open the application here.
The map also has options that allow you to see key moments in the history of life on Earth, such as the extinction of the first vertebrates, the first hominins, and the dinosaurs. The website also shows which dinosaurs lived nearby in the area you’re looking for. For example, Eustreptospondylus was a carnivore that lived in what is now England during the Jurassic period.
Even more interestingly, by entering a location in the search bar, you can find out where the location was millions of years ago. For example, by typing the district you live in and entering a certain time period, you have the chance to see where your district was in the age of the dinosaurs.
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