New Dawn | Walking with Beasts | BBC Documentary Series | Episode 1

49 million years ago, Early Eocene (Germany) Filming location: Java The episode starts by showing how the dinosaurs were dominating the land and that mammals were small. Then it shows how “an asteroid the size of Mount Everest“ struck the Earth and demolished the dinosaurs, and how mammals evolved into new forms thereafter. The first episode depicts the warm tropical world of the early Eocene, sixteen million years after the extinction of the non-avian dinosaurs. Birds, the surviving lineage of the dinosaurs, including the giant carnivorous Gastornis, rule this world, while mammals are still very small. The setting is near the Messel pit in Germany.