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. Geological map of Kutch Basin showing fossil locality Fossils revealed a snake...
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Researchers in the Amazon have discovered the world's largest snake species - an enormous green anaconda - in Ecuador's rainforest that split off from its closest relatives 10 million years ago though they still nearly look identical to this day. A video shared online shows the scale of these 20-foot-long (6.1-meter-long) reptiles as one of the researchers, Dutch biologist Freek Vonk, swims alongside a giant 200-kilo (441-pound) specimen. It was thought that there was only one species of green anaconda in the wild, the Eunectes murinus, but the scientific journal Diversity this month revealed that the new "northern green anaconda" belongs to a different, new species, Eunectes akiyama. "What we were there to do was use the anacondas as an indicator species for what kind of dam...
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