Builders accidentally unearthed – and almost destroyed – a giant snail that lived more than 45m years ago.
The enormous ancient snail, measuring around 40cm (16in) across, was found at the bottom of a pit at a building site.
The rare find was made by palaeontologists visiting the site a couple of weekends ago.
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Researcher Bogdan Zaitsev of the Tavrida Cave Scientific Centre told Russian media last week: “The weather wasn’t great, but we decided to visit the Pneumatika district, where private houses are being built.
“And we didn’t regret it – we discovered a rare snail at the bottom of one of the excavation pits.”
The specimen, weighing about 5kg (11lb), has been identified as a nautilus (Aturia sp.).
These cephalopods went extinct around 45m years ago, though their relatives still thrive in the Atlantic and Indian Oceans today.
Fossils of this size and in such good condition are extremely rare.
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The discovery was made on the outskirts of Simferopol, in Russian-occupied Crimea, as reported by What’s The Jam.
Nautiluses once inhabited the ancient Tethys Ocean, which stretched across vast regions including present-day Crimea.
“This was a time of widespread global warming, when the planet’s average temperature was around 13 degrees higher than it is today,” said Zaitsev.
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The fossil, damaged by construction machinery, will be carefully restored – the fragments will be glued back together and treated with a special solution before going on local display.
During the same outing, the palaeontologists also discovered the fossil of a Campanile giganteum – a large marine snail from the Campanilidae family.
The “Fossils 2.0: Crimea Edition” social media page noted: “Most shelled cephalopods went extinct along with the dinosaurs 65m years ago.
“So by the Eocene (45m years ago) they were already relic species.”
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