Fossil search can be a mental testing of survival , requiring time of day of patient observation as you run down the beach or waterbed for signboard of ancient life . However , one such scavenger Holman Hunt had a rather more gamy - octane ending as a man ’s trip-up in search of a megalodon tooth ensue in his head getting bite by an gator .
The events unfold as Jeffrey Heim go diving in the Myakka River , Florida , wait for fossils of prehistorical shark . alas , May to Juneis tangle season for gator in the surface area , and it seems one amorous reptile was n’t on circuit board with the intrusion .
" I get routine and pulled and what find like a gravy holder hitting me with its full strength , " Heim toldBay News 9 . " I thought I was go to perish flop there . "
A reputation fromWFTS - TVrevealed that Heim ’s accidental injury included a skull fracture and required 34 staples .
“ Hey guys just need to let you bang I ’m doing alright , ” said Heim in a TV shared onTwitter . “ Just really , really want a megalodon tooth . [ I ’m ] gon na be okay . ”
Heim has since returned to the scene of the grisly run - in , where a fellow fossil enthusiast has begun searching for the GoPro that was lose in the attack . While he appear in good spirits in a video posted toInstagram , a quick whip - round of his skull reveals the extent of his injuries from his head ’s brief raid into the jaw of an gator .
The Myakka River in Florida is indeed home to megalodon teeth , owing to the fact that when they swim the sea the part wasunderwater . track down for these treasured remains is effectual ( with the appropriate license or private domain ownership ) but theFlorida Statute 1004.57states that all vertebrate fossils come up on land possess or leased by the state are to be put forward to the Florida Museum of Natural History . The statute aim to assist paleontologists learn more about the range and distribution of the state ’s fogey animals without sap the region of this non - renewable part of Florida ’s inheritance .
It ’s easy to see why megalodon tooth have become such a popular keepsake of ancient Earth , being so tremendous in size as the gnashers of thelargest fishever to float in the ocean . Astudypublished in 2020 break up the code as to the honest size of it of the mighty megalodon , which they predicted was 16 metre ( 52 foot ) long with fins the sizing of an adult homo .
While hunting down the ossified tooth of one of Earth ’s most fearsome predator might be beguiling , it ’s ripe to check there are n’t any extant predatory animal in the region first …
[ H / T : Insider ]
