One year ago, Congress defunded public media. Now that we're 100% community funded, please become a sustaining member or increase your existing membership today.
This is an archival story that predates current editorial management.
This archival content was written, edited, and published prior to LAist's acquisition by its current owner, Southern California Public Radio ("SCPR"). Content, such as language choice and subject matter, in archival articles therefore may not align with SCPR's current editorial standards. To learn more about those standards and why we make this distinction, please click here.
Fossils Belonging To Camel, Huge Elephant Found During Purple Line Construction
One of the cool things about building subways is that you'll find a lot of strange artifacts in the ground. For instance, in 2014, a dig for the London Crossrail uncovered a set of skeletons that were believed to belong to victims of the Black Death. Way gnarly.
Metro just made a (less macabre) discovery earlier this month: excavation crews working on the Purple Line extension unearthed fossils belonging to a pair of extinct animals. The first finding happened on April 12, when they found what is believed to be a 36-inch long femur belonging to an Ice Age elephant, possibly a mammoth or a mastodon, reports the L.A. Times. The next day, the crew found a 20-inch-long forearm belonging to an extinct species of camel. These discoveries were made at the future station at Wilshire and La Brea Avenue in Miracle Mile (looks like the animals barely escaped the gaping maw of the La Brea tar pits).
As noted at The Source—Metro's blog—camels actually originated in North America about 45 million years ago. “It is surprising to most people that camels were once native to Southern California,” said Dr. Ashley Leger, a field director for Cogstone Resource Management, which oversees paleontological matters for the subway project. “Camel bones are quite rare in the fossil record of our area. We are very excited about what we might discover next in this fossil-rich area.”
This isn't the first time that the Purple Line has turned up some old bones. In late 2016, crews found a three-foot piece of a tusk and tooth fragments belonging to either a mastodon or mammoth. Perhaps it's only a matter of time until we find Brendan Fraser encased in a block of ice.
Check out this video of the recent find:
An earlier version of this article incorrectly stated that one of the fossils may belong to a woolly mammoth, specifically. It would be more accurate to say that it may belong to a mammoth.
One year ago, Congress voted to defund public media, eliminating a critical $1.7 million from our budget every year going forward. But they couldn’t silence us, and we’re not going anywhere. LAist is now 100% community funded and that means we’re taking our future into our own hands and turning to you to keep local reporting strong.
You come to LAist because you want independent reporting and trustworthy local information. Our nonprofit newsroom doesn’t answer to shareholders looking to turn a profit. Instead, we answer to you and our communities. We are free to follow facts wherever they lead and to hold power to account without fear or favor. Our only loyalty is to our readers and listeners and our mission: to inform, engage, and strengthen Southern California’s communities.
If this story helped you, please become a monthly member today to help sustain this mission. It just takes 1 minute to donate below.
You come to LAist because you want independent reporting and trustworthy local information. Our nonprofit newsroom doesn’t answer to shareholders looking to turn a profit. Instead, we answer to you and our communities. We are free to follow facts wherever they lead and to hold power to account without fear or favor. Our only loyalty is to our readers and listeners and our mission: to inform, engage, and strengthen Southern California’s communities.
If this story helped you, please become a monthly member today to help sustain this mission. It just takes 1 minute to donate below.
Senior Vice President News, Editor in Chief
