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Ancient Snake Was Longer Than a Bus
By MALCOLM RITTER
Condensed by Native Village
New York City: Not even Hollywood can match a new discovery from the
ancient world. Fossils found in northeastern Colombia reveal a snake that
stretched 42 - 45 feet long and weighed more than 2,500 pounds.
"This thing weighs more than a bison and is longer than a city bus," said Jack
Conrad of the American Museum of Natural History in New York. "It could
easily eat something the size of a cow. A human would just be toast
immediately."
"If it tried to enter my office to eat me, it would have a hard time squeezing
through the door, "said paleontologist Jason Head from the University of Toronto, Missisauga.
Actually, the snake probably munched on ancient relatives of crocodiles in its
rainforest home some 58,000,000 - 60,000,000 years ago.
The snake has been named Titanoboa cerrejonensis ("ty-TAN-o-BO-ah
sare-ah-HONE-en-siss"). That means "titanic boa from Cerrejon," the region where
it was found.
The report is printed in the
journal, "Nature."
Artwork: livescience.com
http://news.aol.com/article/fossil-of-massive-ancient-snake-found/329070?icid=200100397x1217878929x1201248052
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