How do scientists know that a meteorite killed the dinosaurs?
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Others have explained the data, and the asteroid definitely played a huge role. But there was a second, potentially equally deadly and climate changing, effect: the Deccan traps erupted at around the same time, probably caused by a magma plume.
A magma plume is a bit like what you see in a lava lamp. Just hundreds to thousands of miles in size and way hotter. When they reach the surface, the can completely melt it away and cause entire continents to literally melt into a huge lava sea. This has happened at least once.
The eruption of the Deccan traps was not _that_ extreme, it was “only” absurd amounts of vulcanism. That still most likely had a huge effect on the climate.
In the end, it quite possibly was the combined force of huge rock from above and lots of very hot molten rock from below. Maybe some few dinosaurs could have survived one of them, but two such cataclysmic events so close to each other definitely wasn’t fun.
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