60,000-year-old mammoth fossil bones found

A family in North Texas, USA, has just discovered the nearly complete skeleton of a 60,000-year-old mammoth on their property.

The fossilized skeleton of a Colombian mammoth was carefully excavated by paleontologists on Wayne McEwen's property in Texas, USA. Photo: Twitter.

The fossilized skeleton was found while Wayne McEwen's son and grandson were digging a hole on family property in Ellis County, north Texas, in May.

After unearthing a 1.8m tusk, Mr McEwen immediately called a group of volunteers to his house to conduct a more careful dig. Eventually, they unearthed the nearly complete skeleton of a Columbian mammoth, which lived across North America and southern Mexico before becoming extinct about 12,500 years ago.

The McEwen family decided to donate the skeleton to the Perot Museum of Nature and Science in Dallas. Museum staff estimate it to be between 20,000 and 60,000 years old.

"This mammoth skeleton is particularly significant because it is part of the heritage and natural history of North Texas," NBC News quoted Colleen Walker, executive director of the Perot Museum, as saying.

Tom Vance, a paleontologist at Navarro College in Texas, believes the elephant could be a female because it was about 2.7 meters tall and was similar in size to today's female Asian elephants.

According to VnExpress