The Gaskiers glaciation
A short, sharp ice age — and complex life appears almost the moment it ends.
- When
- Known to
- ± 3 million years
- Era
- Neoproterozoic, Proterozoic
Around 580 million years ago glaciers advance again, though far more briefly than the Cryogenian snowballs, lasting perhaps under a million year. The first large Ediacaran organisms appear in Newfoundland immediately above the Gaskiers deposits, prompting suggestions of a 'glacial fuse' for animal evolution — though macrofossils have since been found beneath the glacial beds too, complicating the story.