Free Republic

Paleontologists are in the final stages of extracting the skeleton of a huge mammoth discovered buried two metres underneath a busy street in the Mexican city Tultepec. New images of the excavation site have revealed the sheer size of the prehistoric animal, which experts believe died between 12,000 and 14,000 years ago in what is now the city's suburb of San Antonio Xahuento. With a metre-wide skull and tusks spanning more than ten feet, the skeleton belongs to Mammuthus Columbi, a North American mammoth which expects believe grew sixteen feet high and weighed up to 10 tonnes.