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The fish were killed \"pretty suddenly because of the violence of that water,\" said the study's co-author, David Burnham, preparator of vertebrate paleontology at the University of Kansas Biodiversity Institute. One of the fossilized fish had broken in half after it hit a tree, Burnham said.

Finding these hundreds of ancient fish fossils is even more significant because the fish are cartilaginous instead of bony, and less prone to fossilization, Burnham said. Scientists are also discovering new species within the collection of fossils.

\"PHOTO:
Robert DePalma/Kansas University/AFP/Getty Images
PHOTO: The University of Kansas' Robert DePalma(L)and field assistant Kylie Ruble(R) excavate fossil carcasses from the Tanis deposit, March 29, 2019.
>

The planet was \"inherited\" by mammals after the asteroid's impact, Burnham said.

“We’ve understood that bad things happened right after the impact, but nobody’s found this kind of smoking-gun evidence,” he said. “People have said, ‘We get that this blast killed the dinosaurs, but why don’t we have dead bodies everywhere?’ Well, now we have bodies. They’re not dinosaurs, but I think those will eventually be found, too.”

The study will be published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, according to the University of Kansas.

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