When dinosaurs almost didn't rule the Earth

Published on Saturday 13 September 2008 19:36

NICK Drainey's World View

THE WORLD

Thanks to a big stroke of luck 200 million years ago, dinosaurs beat out a fearsome group of creatures competing for the right to rule the Earth, scientists claimed last week.

Dinosaurs appeared about 230 million years ago, during the Triassic Period, and competed for 30 million years with a group of reptiles called crurotarsans, cousins of today's crocodiles that grew to huge sizes and looked a lot like dinosaurs.

Scientists led by Steve Brusatte of Columbia University and the American Museum of Natural History in New York conducted an extensive review of fossils and found that the two groups were evolving at roughly the same pace.

But the dinosaurs won out, Brusatte concluded, because some type of planetary calamity 200 million years ago – dramatic climate change or maybe a large meteorite impact – nearly wiped out the crurotarsans while sparing the dinosaurs.

"The fundamental question is why were the dinosaurs able to become so dominant," Brusatte, whose study is in the journal Science, said. "Evolution on a big scale oftentimes is a matter of luck."

UNITED STATES

A man who purchased a $53.5m penthouse in New York's famed Plaza Hotel on the basis of a video viewing claimed the apartment turned out to be an "attic-like space" with low ceilings and obstructed views. The buyer, who is believed to be a Russian financier,

is suing the hotel, developers El-Ad Properties and brokers Stribling & Associates for breach of contract, fraud, deceptive trade practices and negligence.

"This is a classic bait-and-switch," said Y David Scharf, the buyer's attorney. "My client was led to believe that it would receive one of the most luxurious apartments in New York history. It got far less than what it bargained for."

UNITED ARAB EMIRATES

The United Arab Emirates has stopped a Ramadan soap opera after complaints in Saudi that it was stoking ancient tribal rivalries.

President Khalifa bin Zayed ordered Abu Dhabi Television to end broadcasts of Saadoun al-Awajy, which had been running nightly throughout the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan "in response to appeals by several Arab tribes".

AUSTRALIA

The police minister in New South Wales was forced to resign on Thursday over accusations that he "dirty danced" in underwear and simulated a sex act on the chest of a female colleague in a drunken late-night office party.

Matt Brown resigned just three days after being sworn in to the post, although the party occurred some time before.

OH, REALLY

San Antonio unveiled a deal last week that will make it the first US city to harvest methane gas from human waste on a commercial scale and turn it into clean-burning fuel.

Residents of the Texan city produce about 140,000 tons a year of a substance referred to as "biosolids", which can be reprocessed into natural gas, said Steve Clouse, chief operating officer of the city's water system.

The city approved a deal where Massachusetts-based Ameresco Inc will convert the city's biosolids into natural gas, Clouse said. Methane gas is a principal component of the natural gas used to fuel furnaces, power plants and other combustion-based generators.

MOVERS & SHAKERS

NICOLE KIDMAN

Nicole Kidman was named the most overpaid celebrity in Hollywood in the second annual list of least bankable stars by US magazine Forbes, taking the top slot from fellow Australian Russell Crowe.

Kidman's films were estimated to only earn $1 for every dollar the Oscar-winning actress was paid compared with $8 a year ago.

The Invasion even lost $2.68 for every dollar earned by Kidman, who was reportedly paid $17m for her role.

BORAT

A New York City judge has thrown out lawsuits brought by a driving instructor and two etiquette school teachers who said the makers of the movie Borat deceived them.

Judge Loretta Preska said in her ruling that all three accepted money and signed agreements releasing the filmmakers from liability,

and consented to appear in a "documentary-style" movie. The 2006 film Borat: Cultural Learnings Of America For Make Benefit Glorious Nation Of Kazakhstan, starred comedian Sacha Baron Cohen as an anti-semitic journalist travelling the US in pursuit of Pamela Anderson.

BRITNEY SPEARS

Genealogists at the London Metropolitan Archives discovered the pop star's great-grandparents, George Anthony Portell and Lillian Esther Lewis, had been living together before they were married.

But there could be an innocent explanation – Portell was an able seaman in the Royal Navy, and may not have had an address of his own.