Fossil vertebrae unearthed in a lignite mine are the remains of one of the largest snakes that ever lived, a monster estimated at up to 49 feet (15 meters) in length – longer than a T. rex – that prowled the swamps of India around 47 million years ago.
Scientists said on Thursday they have recovered 27 vertebrae from the snake, including a few still in the same position as they would have been when the limbless reptile was alive. They said the snake, which they named Vasuki indicus, would have looked like a modern-day large python and would not have been venomous.
The mine is located in the Panandhro area of the Kutch district in western India’s state of Gujarat. Lignite is the lowest grade of coal.
Fossils revealed a snake that stretched an estimated 36 feet (11 meters) to 50 feet (15 meters). It’s comparable to the largest known snake at about 42 feet (13 meters) that once lived in what is now Colombia.
The largest living snake today is Asia’s reticulated python at 33 feet (10 meters).
The newly discovered behemoth lived 47 million years ago in western India’s swampy evergreen forests. It could have weighed up to 2,200 pounds (1,000 kilograms), researchers said in the journal Scientific Reports.
They gave it the name Vasuki indicus after “the mythical snake king Vasuki, who wraps around the neck of the Hindu deity Shiva,” said Debajit Datta, a postdoctoral researcher in paleontology at the Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee (IITR) and lead author of the study published in the journal Scientific Reports, opens new tab.
This monster snake wasn’t especially swift to strike.
“Considering its large size, Vasuki was a slow-moving ambush predator that would subdue its prey through constriction,” Datta said in an email.
Fragments of the snake’s backbone were discovered in 2005 by co-author Sunil Bajpai, based at the same institute, near Kutch, Gujarat, in western India. The researchers compared more than 20 fossil vertebrae to skeletons of living snakes to estimate size.
While it’s not clear exactly what Vasuki ate, other fossils found nearby reveal that the snake lived in swampy areas alongside catfish, turtles, crocodiles and primitive whales, which may have been its prey, Datta said.
The other extinct giant snake, Titanoboa, was discovered in Colombia and is estimated to have lived around 60 million years ago.
The biggest Vasuki vertebra was around 4-1/2 inches (11.1 cm) wide. Vasuki appears to have had a broad, cylindrical body perhaps around 17 inches (44 cm) wide. The skull was not found.
“Vasuki was a majestic animal,” Datta said. “It may well have been a gentle giant, resting its head on a high porch formed by coiling its massive body for most parts of the day or moving sluggishly through the swamp like an endless train. In some ways it reminds me of (fictional giant snake) Kaa from ‘The Jungle Book.'”
“The estimated body length of Vasuki is comparable to that of Titanoboa, although the vertebrae of Titanoboa are slightly larger than those of Vasuki. However, at this point, we cannot say if Vasuki was more massive or slender compared to Titanoboa,” said paleontologist and study co-author Sunil Bajpai, a professor at IITR.
These huge snakes lived during the Cenozoic era, which began after the dinosaur age ended 66 million years ago.
Vasuki was a member of the Madtsoiidae snake family that appeared roughly 90 million years ago but went extinct about 12,000 years ago. These snakes spread from India through southern Eurasia and into north Africa after the Indian subcontinent collided with Eurasia around 50 million years ago, Bajpai said.
This was a dominant snake family during the dinosaur age’s latter stages and into the early Cenozoic before its diversity dropped, Bajpai added.
“Snakes are amazing creatures that often leave us stunned because of their size, agility and deadliness,” Datta said. “People are scared of them as some snakes are venomous and have a fatal bite. But snakes perhaps attack people out of fear rather than with an intent to attack. I believe snakes, like most animals, are peaceful creatures, and an important component of our ecosystem.”
What these two monster snakes have in common is that they lived during periods of exceptionally warm global climates, said Jason Head, a Cambridge University paleontologist who was not involved in the study.
“These snakes are giant cold-blooded animals,” he said. “A snake requires higher temperatures” to grow into large sizes.
So does that mean that global warming will bring back monster-sized snakes?
In theory, it’s possible. But the climate is now warming too quickly for snakes to evolve again to be giants, he said. (AP/Reuters)