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The seals run to escape a chasing giant Megalodon shark.
The old one Otodus megalodon, the largest shark to ever swim in our planet’s oceans, still inhabited the sea until about 3.6 million years ago. The exact causes of the species’ extinction are still debated, probably a combination of environmental change and competition with smaller shark species, such as the great white shark Carcharodon carcharias, He played a role.
Despite its fame in pop culture, surprisingly little is known about the megalodon’s life appearance. As the shark has only a cartilaginous skeleton, only its hard teeth survive the long and arduous process of fossilization. Megalodon was previously thought to be a close relative of the great white shark (Carcharodon carcharias) based on observed similarities between fossil teeth and current Carcharodon teeth. The great white shark is often over 19 feet (or meters) long. So megalodon was depicted as a very large white shark with length estimates ranging from 80 to 100 feet (25 to 30 meters). However, it is now classified in the extinct family Otodontidae, which diverged from the great white shark lineage during the Lower Cretaceous, about 100 million years ago.
6-inch fossil megalodon tooth compared to a 2-inch great white shark tooth from a recent day.
A study published in the journal Scientific reports uses the growth curves of five current shark species – Carcharodon carcharias, Isurus oxyrinchus, Isurus paucus, Lamna ditropis and Lamna nasus – for the estimation of body size in extinct species O. megalodon.
The results suggest that an adult megalodon likely had a head about 15.2 feet long, a dorsal fin 5.3 feet high, and a tail 12.6 feet long, reaching a total length of 52 , 5 feet (or 16 meters).
