Chilean Scientists Discover 12000-Year-Old Elephant Remains

Trending News: The remains of Gomphotheres – an extinct relative of the modern elephant – were found by scientists near Lake Tagua Tagua, a glacial lake in Cochamo, Chile. According to the researchers, the remains dates back around 12,000 years and suggests that the specie was quite dominant in the region.

The remains showed that the animal weighed around four tonnes and its height was somewhere around 9.5-9.8 feet. As a result, the scientists concluded that it took groups to hunt them down.

Carlos Tornero, an archeologist working on the site, said that the evidence shows Gomphotheres roamed in this region thousands of years ago but were hunted down by the inhabitants.

“The hypothesis we’re working with is that it’s about hunting, hunting events,” Tornero told Reuters.

“We think this because the Gomphothere is a very large animal and dangerous and it probably required several people (to hunt),” he added.

This was a significant find in a region where researchers have discovered the remains of a number of various ancient species in the past.

The scientists believed that the discovery of Gomphotheres remains was crucial for understanding the changing habitation in the region and it can also present a clear picture of how climate change has affected animals over the years.

“We can get a lot of information from here, for example with regards to climate change, how it affected animals,” said Elisa Calas, an archaeologist also working on the site, told Reuters. “The influence humans had on the environment which is very in line with what’s happening now in terms of the environment.”