Nine-year-old girl discovers 5-inch tooth of extinct Megalodon shark on Maryland beach.
It won’t be wrong to say that fossil hunters and paleontologists spend decades discovering rare and ancient things of significance. And why not? After all, it is this discovery that introduces human beings to the extinct species that inhabited our planet in the past. Moreover, such discoveries hold immense importance for future generations, who get to learn a lot about the yesteryears. Now one such extinct species is the Megalodon, belonging to the mackerel shark species that lived approximately 23 to 3.6 million years ago. While fossil remains of the megalodon have been found earlier, finding it wasn’t honestly a cakewalk. However, a nine-year-old couldn’t believe her luck, after she found an enormous 5-inch megalodon tooth on a beach in the United States. It happened when a girl named Molly Sampson was searching for shark teeth with her family in Maryland’s Calvert Beach.
Now the incident came to light after Molly’s mother Alicia Bruce Sampson took to her Facebook account to share the whole incident along with a couple of pictures. While Alicia appeared unknown of the fact to whom the tooth belonged to and was amazed by its enormous size, a BBC report confirmed that the tooth belongs to the now-extinct Otodus megalodon shark species. Taking to her caption, Alicia revealed that Molly and her sister Natalie Sampson wanted to “go shark tooth hunting like experts”, and for the same, they asked their parents for insulated chest waders as a Christmas present. After finishing their breakfast, the two girls headed out to the beach with their father Bruce Sampson. As soon as they reached there, Molly started wading in the knee-deep water and searching the sand. This is when she spotted the huge tooth, which was 5 inches long and the size of her hand.
After her discovery, the family took the tooth to the Calvert Marine Museum to confirm the fossil’s identity and also shared the same to their official Facebook account. While sharing a couple of pictures with Molly and the fossil, the museum wrote in the caption, “Future paleontologist, Molly, was out searching for fossils on Christmas morning when, what to her wondering eyes appeared…but a huge Megalodon tooth! Molly was excited to share her awesome find with our paleontology department last week at the museum!”
In the first picture, Molly can be seen standing with the giant tooth in her hand at the beach. While the second picture shows Molly smiling at the camera, the third picture is a close-up shot of the tooth in Molly’s hands. In the last picture, Molly and the museum staff can be seen posing in front of the Megalodon Jaw kept in the museum.
Read all the Latest News, Trending News, Cricket News, Bollywood News,India News and Entertainment News here. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.