00:04this is a dig site in israel and a site of a recent and exciting paleontological find this
00:10is the fossilized tusk of a prehistoric elephant they used to walk the lands around the mediterranean
00:15this is avi levy the director of the excavation he says the tusk is a massive 8.2 feet long
00:21and
00:21it belonged to the equally large straight tusked elephant or paleoloxodon antiquus he says it's an
00:27extremely good condition which is a rarity oh it's unique because the state of preservation is really
00:32good we didn't saw so much a preserved tusk like this we know that this type of animal the straight
00:38tusk animal disappears from this area around 400 000 years old and this uh tusk is dated to 500 000
00:47years old he says just one tusk from these elephants can weigh around 330 pounds and this is the largest
00:52complete one they've ever found when the species roam the lands they would have stood nearly 14
00:56feet tall or upwards of 40 percent larger than modern day elephants weighing in at around 16 tons around
01:0332 and a half thousand pounds
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