The Mystery of the Beresovka Mammoth

If you have seen the movie the day after tomorrow you have heard of the Beresovka Mammoth. It was the mammoth that was supposedly in the Smithsonian, however all that remains Today is a mammoth replica, which is covered with one third of the original skin and hair of the Beresovka mammoth and is displayed in St. Petersburg� zoological museum. Below you will find a brief outline of the story.

www.gi.alaska.edu...

In the early part of this century the famous Beresovka mammoth carcass was discovered in Siberia. Nearly intact, the animal was found buried in silty gravel sitting in the upright position. The mammoth had a broken foreleg, evidently caused by a fall from a nearby cliff 10,000 years ago. The remains of its stomach were intact and there were grasses and buttercups lodged between its teeth. The flesh was still edible, but reportedly not tasty.

No one has ever satisfactorily explained how the Beresovka mammoth and other animals found frozen in the sub arctic could have been frozen before being consumed by predators of the time. Some have proposed a sudden change in climate, but this hardly seems a likely explanation. The scientist who uncovered the Beresovka mammoth conjectured that the animal fell into a snow-filled ravine that protected the body until it was perhaps covered by gravel during a summer flood.

Here is how scientists have attempted to explain the amazing freezing mammoth.

Theory # 1

Huge herds of mammoths used t roam the tundra feeding off the grasses, reeds, and other plants that still cover the land in summer. Every now and then one of them would get trapped in ice or would fall to its death down a crevasse in a glacier, there the carcass would freeze and be preserved almost unchanged forever.

Problems with Theory #1

To begin with the carcasses were found in the wrong places. Vast areas of the Arctic are covered with ice, but most of the tundra is composed of soil, sand, river silt, and loam bound by frozen water. The frozen mammoths were discovered not in the ice but in the silt layers.

Furthermore, during the relevant period, there were no glaciers in Siberia except in the upper reaches of the mountains where the mammoths did not graze.

Theory #2

The mammoths had fallen into rivers and had been carried downstream to the estuaries, where they were buried in the silt.

Problems with Theory # 2

The mammoths were being found in the tundra between the river valleys and not all could have drowned because many were found standing upright.

Further Research

To get to the bottom of the mystery scientists consulted experts in the deep freeze butchery industry. However instead of clearing things up they made them much more troublesome. Basically they said it was not possible to deep freeze a creature the size of a mammoth in the relative moderate temps of the arctic.

Basically if meat is frozen slowly at freezing temp crystals form in the cells of the flesh bursting the cells and dehydrating the meat. The butchers concluded no such process could have produced the deep frozen mammoth meat.

To satisfactorily freeze a side of beef takes 30 minutes at -40 degrees Fahrenheit. To deep freeze a huge living warm blooded mammoth, insulated in thick fur, they estimated that temperatures below -150 degrees would be required. Temperatures so low have never been recorded in nature, not even in the artic.

This has simply made all normal theories for the Beresovka mammoth that much more obsolete.

To add to the mystery consider the climate needed for buttercups to grow. Buttercups enjoy temperate conditions with alternation sun and rain Click here for Buttercup Climate info

These are the unalterable facts a mammoth grazing buttercup in a temperate climate all of the sudden is frozen stiff by unimaginable cold. The question is how it happened, to this day a feasible explanation has not been put forward.

Reference:

Strange Stories, Amazing Facts, Readers Digest. 1980



The Beresovka mammoth found in situ

[edit on 15-6-2004 by BlackJackal]

Food still in the mouths, food undigested in stomachs (even though digestive actions continue three days after death)... all accounts point to a quick and rapid freezing process, not some gradual Ice Age.

I like the movie Day After Tomorrow, but you have to remember that the creators even said (in interviews and in book) it would take decades for their kind of world catastrophy, not a week (which was used for movie dramatics).

So how was there a quick freezing?

Polar shift couldn't account for it all... you would need something on a larger scale (as if shift isn't large enough). And you would need great amounts of readily available water to freeze.

Super comet? Naah... bigger. Something big enough to turn the planet upside down, to pull the water to the very poles... something that could have plunged the wourld into total icy darkness... like perhaps another planet, wrecking havok on ours.

I have a link, but not on me right now, but you know Sedna? This planetoid object recently discovered? Lead astronomers stated that the last time it was around earth, we had the Ice Age...

the global superstorm theory could account for it. that is the whole point of the theory, that the climate changes drastically as a result of huge storms which plummet the temperature and dump vast amounts of snow and ice.

where in the book did it say it would take decades for the change to occur? in the coming global superstorm by art bell the change happened rapdily. ive read the book and it wasnt decades in the book, it was rapid pretty much like the movie.

What about the possibility of a turning over process in the atmosphere. The mid to upper levels got so cold that the air became too heavy and sank rapidly to the surface. Or a large asteroid going through our atmosphere at just the right angle to mix up the atmosphere and force the super cold air from the upper atmosphere down to the surface. An object that just grazed the surface but never impacted.

This has been one of my favorite "mysteries" since childhood. I remember reading about it, oh, when I was 7 or 8 or so and being absolutely fascinated at the thought of a mammoth being frozen perfectly with buttercups in its mouth.
*double take*
Actually, I read about it in Strange Stories, Amazing Facts!
Great post, and thank you for bringing this up.

Originally posted by Banshee
Actually, I read about it in Strange Stories, Amazing Facts!
Great post, and thank you for bringing this up.

Strange Stories, Amazing Facts is one of my favorite books. My Father-in-law had it and I would read it every time we went to his house but he would never let me take it home. One day I ran across it in a Thrft Store for $1.98, what a deal.

Yet Another Scientific Theory

A worldwide Earthquake and volcanic eruption more violent that any ever recorded in history.

The crust of the earth, which floats 20 to 60 miles thick over the molten interior of our planet, is known to be composed of several plates, pressed one against the other. Where two plates meet, under titanic thrusts from every side volcanic eruptions and earthquakes may occur.

It is thought that the eruption that caused the death of the mammoths was the result of two plates grinding together and bursting open a vast seam deep within the earths crust.

In so violent an eruption, not only would fiery lava be spewed out from the interior of the earth but there would be a great dishcharge of volcanic gases.

If these gases were shot high enough into the upper atomosphere, they would be cooled to incredibly low temperatures. Then in the Upheavel, they would spiral toward the poles, eventually decending on the warm blanket of air beneath. Through this they would penetrate as violent gusts, cutting through the blanket at its thinest spots and hurtling at incredible speeds down upon the earth.

The result in localities where the gases struck would be unimaginably cold, suffiecent to produce the -150 temperature postulated by the deep-freeze experts.

My theory of the subject is that uranium 238 gradually fissicaly decayed causing a chain reaction plunging the world into a nuclear winter