Russian scientists have uncovered the remains of a 50,000-year-old baby mammoth, which was found in thawing permafrost in the remote Yakutia region of Siberia over the summer.
They say the “Yana” – named after the river basin in which it was discovered – is the best preserved mammoth carcass in the world.
Weighing more than 100 kilograms, measuring 120 centimeters (4 feet) and 200 centimeters long, Yana was estimated to have been just one year old when she died.
Before this discovery, only six similar finds had been made in the world – five in Russia and one in Canada.
Yana was found in Patajica Crater, the world's largest permafrost (permanently frozen ground), by people living nearby.
The head of the Lazarev Museum's mammoth laboratory said that the inhabitants “were in the right place at the right time.”
“They saw that the mammoth had almost completely melted,” Maxim Cherbasov said, and decided to build a makeshift stretcher to lift the mammoth to the surface.
“As a general rule, the part that molts first, especially the trunk, is often eaten by predators or modern birds,” he told Reuters news agency.
“Although the forelimbs have already been eaten, the head is very well preserved,” he added.
Gavril Novgorodov, a researcher at the museum, told Reuters that the mammoth was “likely trapped” in a swamp and thus “preserved for several tens of thousands of years.”
Yana is being studied at the North-Eastern Federal University in the region's capital, Yakutsk.
Scientists are now conducting tests to confirm the time of his death.
And this is not the only prehistoric find found in Russia's vast permafrost in recent years. Where long-frozen ground begins to melt due to climate change.
Just last month, scientists in the same area displayed remains Partial mummified body of a saber-toothed catIt is believed to be just under 32,000 years old.
Earlier this year, the remains of a 44,000-year-old wolf were also discovered.
