At https://www.livescience.com/animals/extinct-species/siberian-gold-miners-accidentally-find-ancient-woolly-rhino-mummy-with-horn-and-soft-tissues-still-intact …. gold mining in the Russian Sakla Republic has come upon a woolly rhino buried in permafrost – although whether the permafrost had melted or not is left unsaid in the press release. Basically, a fossil that must have been buried or frozen very quickly in order to preserve soft tissue. The discovery led to its head being removed and taken away to a laboratory – or the local museum. The rest of the body awaits excavation which will take some time as presumably the ground is frozen. This will be done in order to find out what the environment was like when it was feeding – at point of death. This cannot happen until the whole beast is pulled out of the sediementary rock layer. One to watch for future updates.
Gold Mining in a quarry in Siberia
9 August 2024Catastrophism, Geology, Palaeontology