NESSC-researcher Shaun Akse blogs from the Urbino Summer School for Paleoclimatology :

Day 5 of the Summer School involved one of the most exciting aspects of being active in the Earth Science world: a field day!

On this day we put into practice some of the things we covered in the course. We got to see real life examples of different hyperthermal events such as the PETM and the Elmo, witnessed Milankovitch cycles preserved in the formations and touched the great Oceanic Anoxic Event II .

We also visited one of the first outcrops that inspired the impact hypothesis of the great Cretaceous-Tertiary boundary extinction, which was thoroughly explained by Simone Galeotti as: “Dinosaurs… No dinosaurs”. At this location we also became part of the site’s great history by enjoying a long lunch at the local restaurant. We followed the tradition of eating mushroom-truffle pasta and signing the guestbook where hundreds of Earth scientists have signed before.

Overall, a fruitful day in the field which we will build on by analysing the logs we created for cyclicality and presenting our work on Tuesday.