Woolly Mammoths, once thought extinct, are once again coming into the public eye as video footage from Siberia claims to show one of the creatures as it crosses a river. The footage, originally taken by a government worker in Siberia as he planned for road building, is to say the least strange. The footage is certainly raising many eyebrows. Is this a sign that the jury may still be out on the Woolly Mammoth? If the creature does turn out to still be alive, it wouldn’t be the first to be prematurely declared extinct – although it would no doubt be one of the most famous.
It’s one of those symbols of the ancient world, the Woolly Mammoth. It’s said that the creature was one of a select few that sustained humanity as we trekked outward and spread around the globe, eventually being hunted to extinction within the span of a few thousand years. Its dying out marked a passage in human evolution. It was the hunt for the mammoth that is widely cited as the motivation for the first steps of human cooperation and communication. The last mammoths were said to have died out on Pleistocene Island around 1700 BC.
But the mammoth is not always believed to have become extinct. In 1899 a rumor began circulating that a hunter which had been deep in the icy wilderness of Alaska had come across one of the creatures and, upon seeing it, shot it and killed it. The creature was said to have been donated to the Smithsonian Institute in Washington DC, though this exhibition was never seen. The Smithsonian denied any involvement in any such exhibition. No remains were ever found.
There are a few places the creatures are rumored to still exist in cryptozoological circles. One of the most prominent places is indeed Russia. The icy wilderness of Siberia’s Ural mountain range is one of the most mysterious places on Earth ranging in enigmas from Dyatlov Pass where several skiers mysteriously lost their lives to the repeated sightings of unidentified flying objects. If the Woolly Mammoth were somehow to have survived all this time without being observed by humans, there are few places more promising to look than Russia.
The footage, displayed by The Sun shows the creature wading through the icy water clearly used to the frigid temperatures of the Siberian wilderness. Several have come forward with their own interpretation of what is being filmed. While it does appear to be a young Woolly Mammoth, others claim the story is too good to be true, suggesting the entire thing must be a hoax. Still others suggest it may have been an honest mistake, believing the creature filmed to be a bear and explaining the trunk by suggesting it may have been dragging a large stick or a fish through the water.
While the video does clearly show something mammoth shaped, there is a tiny point of interest at the point where the trunk reaches the head of the creature – and there is a speck of white which appears to be a tusk, which would rule out the bear explanation.
Is there a Woolly Mammoth still alive wandering through the Siberian wilderness? Examine the video and judge for yourself. If the creature does exist, there will likely be more soon. Scientists have already begun examining the possibility of cloning mammoths.
