The Truth Of The 'Most Dangerous Place In History Of Planet Earth'

Casablanca painted a pretty grim picture of Morocco, preemptively depicting it as the Mos Eisley Cantina of World War II. Any number of dangerous situations might unfold there: You might be shot down by Nazis, robbed blind by skilled thieves, or, worst of all, your ex-girlfriend might show up and expect you to give up on your dream of running a pretty chill bar with your best friend.

Morocco has a long, bleak history in real life, as well. Over the centuries, the North African nation has been rocked fairly consistently by wars both holy and secular. Human Rights Watch has listed numerous concerns with the country's government, citing the imprisonment of citizens for denouncing state implemented torture, and mandatory prison sentences for reporters whose comments are considered "defamatory." That said, taking a glass-is-half-full view of history, things could always be worse. According to paleontologist Nizar Ibrahim and his team of internationally renowned researchers, Morocco has seen significantly worse days, and the worst of these times occurred around 100 million years ago. They sound like a doozy.

In a recently published study, researchers outlined a region called the Kem Kem Group, better known today as southeastern Morocco, as a Cretaceous Period dinosaur nightmare. Describing this point in space and time, Ibrahim stated, "This was arguably the most dangerous place in the history of planet Earth, a place where a human time-traveller would not last very long" (via University of Portsmouth).

Among the residents of this Flintstones fight club: Carcharodontosaurus, a 40-foot-long T. rex knockoff with a five-foot skull, and a taste for flesh. There was Deltadromeus, which was essentially a Spielberg-style Velociraptor, but eight meters long. And, to top it off, the bountiful rivers were home to enormous fish, drawing in numerous giant crocodile and predatory pterosaur species. It was, in essence, a multi-millennial second act of a Jurassic Park movie.

Now, whether or not the presence of an abnormally high number of dinosaurs makes a location "the most dangerous place on Earth," is up for debate. The bottom of the ocean seems pretty unforgiving at any point in history, and there are parts of Detroit where you just don't go. Still, the fact that these paleontologists specifically singled out the dangers to time travelers? That's charming. We'll give it a pass.