The Ordovician Period started at a major extinction event called the Cambrian-Ordovician extinction events some time about 488.3 ± 1.7 Ma (million years ago), and lasted for about 44.6 million years. It ended with the Ordovician–Silurian extinction event, about 443.7 ± 1.5
For most of the Late Ordovician, life continued to flourish, but at and near the end of the period there were mass-extinction events that seriously affected planktonic forms like conodonts, graptolites, and some groups of trilobites (Agnostida and Ptychopariida, which completely died out, and the Asaphida, which were much reduced). Brachiopods, bryozoans and echinoderms were also heavily affected, and the endocerid cephalopods died out completely, except for possible rare Silurian forms. The Ordovician-Silurian Extinction Events may have been caused by an ice age that occurred at the end of the Ordovician period as the end of the Late Ordovician was one of the coldest times in the last 600 million years of earth history.