‘The sharks basically just disappeared overnight’: Scientists have found a mysterious ancient extinction event

When palaeobiologist Elizabeth Sibert set out to build a record of fish and shark populations over millions of years, she didn’t expect to be solving a mysterious disappearance case.

And then they vanished.

Global shark populations were wiped out by up to 90 per cent around 19 million years ago, even though there were no signs of sudden climatic or environmental changes.