The frozen and well-preserved carcass of a missing wool rhino – with its last mass still inside – was recovered in Siberia, where it spent about 34,000 years in barren permafrost, according to a report.
Scientists found the beast – which was 80 percent intact, with its teeth still in place – near where the world’s only wool rhino, named Sasha, was dug in 2014, East2West News reported.
“According to preliminary estimates, the rhino is three or four years old … most likely drowned in the river,” said scientist Albert Protopopov.
“The case is very well preserved. Among other things, some of the internal organs are preserved, which will allow in the future to study in more detail how the species ate and lived “, he added.
The genus of the Pleistocene animal, which was discovered in the Abyisky district of Yakutia along with a nearby horn, has not yet been revealed.
Sasha was 34,000 years old, but the new rhinoceros could be between 20,000 and 50,000 years old, according to Valery Plotnikov, a researcher at the Academy of Sciences in the Sakha Republic.
“But we haven’t done radiocarbon tests yet,” he said.
Protopopov said that “the Abyisky rhino can already be called the only one of its kind in the world.”
He added: “Earlier, not even the bone remains of individuals from this era were found, not to mention the carcasses of preserved animals.”
The case is being kept in a glacier pending relocation to Yakutsk, where it will be presented to the scientific community.
Pavel Yefimov, a local entrepreneur who was behind the discovery, presents the animal at the Academy of Sciences.