SEATTLE - In the crowded south Lake Union neighbor hood where Amazon. com workers head out for espresso, an ice age mammoth died 10, 000 years back and remained until Tuesday, each time a plumbing contractor crew uncovered its tusk.
Bruce Crowley, the museum's Preparator for the Paleontology Division, examines what museum officials believe is mammoth tusk that has been uncovered by construction industry workers in the south Lake Union section of Seattle. (AP Photo/Burke Museum)
Paleontologists with the University of Washington aspire to move the tusk to the Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture over time for public viewing at its annual Dino Day on March 8.
Oahu is the latest exemplory instance of their state fossil: the Columbian mammoth, Mammuthus columbi.
"They are extremely rare, " said Christian Sidor, curator of vertebrate paleontology for the museum on the Seattle campus. "It will soon be a fantastic fossil to have back once again to the museum. "
A Transit Plumbing employee discovered the tusk Tuesday at a construction site.
Worker Joe Wells "actually uncovered it with a shovel and kind of figured it absolutely was a tusk and stopped and contacted the typical contractor, " Transit Plumbing owner Jeff Estep said.
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When Estep was told in regards to the discovery, "I was going, like, 'Yeah, right. '"
It absolutely was more exciting compared to time they found a jar of money some body had buried in a garden, that he said.
The Burke Museum was awaiting approval from the home owner Wednesday to excavate your website and maybe see if you will find more buried bones.
"When you start digging, there is a constant know, " Sidor said.
Millennia before Seattle was founded, prehistoric animals wandered around what exactly is now Lake Union and the lands included in the university and the headquarters for on the web retailer Amazon. com.
Construction has been constant recently in the South Lake Union neighbor hood, which also features biotech organizations and apartments and condos for 1000s of workers.
Similar tusks from the extinct relative of the elephant have now been present in Washington, and a tooth from the mammoth even was available at a construction site at the university.
