yego.me
💡 Stop wasting time. Read Youtube instead of watch. Download Chrome Extension

How These Female Cavers Recovered New Human Ancestor Fossils (Exclusive Video) | National Geographic


2m read
·Nov 11, 2024

Six remarkable young scientists squeeze through a 12 m crawl down a shoot 18 cm wide to get these fossils of a new species of early human ancestors, homon edti. It's really unusual to see all women scientists in these kinds of situations where you are expected to enter into and work within what might be considered a fairly risky or dangerous situation. Ordinarily, it's the men jumping at these things. But I think because of the size limitations on getting down into the site, women were given more of a chance to sort of get their foot in the door.

"Hello Command Center, this is Marine at the top of the shoot. I'm just about to descend. Thank you, bye." You start by descending down a fairly narrow shaft, and some tunnels you have to crawl on your stomach for about 3 m. Then you enter into another chamber; this is what we call the dragon's back, with a 4 or 5 m drop on either side.

At the top of the shaft, you start the 12 m descent into the chamber. You then go through another passageway into the main fossil chamber. The first thing that came through my mind when I went through the final slot was Howard Carter opening Tutankhamun's tomb and Lord Carnarvon saying, "What do you see?" and Carter says, "Things, wonderful things."

"Wow, God, this place is beautiful. There is no find like this anywhere else. This is extraordinary on every level." It's almost hard to put into words what this is going to mean for the story that we tell ourselves about where we came from. We're really after this story; this is what excites us.

It's not entirely clear at this point how it got there. They are so unusual; it doesn't seem to fit any currently known paradigm for fossil hominins. Unfortunately, the level of CO2 within this particular chamber of the cave system has biked to a critical point, so we need to leave, so we're not all suffocating. We need to get to the surface; CO2 up to 1,300.

Those first couple of days were probably some of the hardest, most difficult days of their life physically because I was scared to leave people down there for too long. I was trying to rotate them out, which forced them to climb in and out this torturous path.

"How fantastic!" and they, of course, were like horses chomping at the bit to get in there. You know, we're ready to get out and ready to go back in. "Have a blast, huh?"

Thank you. We do. To be face to face with these fossils and to be touching them and handling them, it's very humbling. Just being able to be a part of this find is a wonderful honor.

More Articles

View All
Science of Laser Hair Removal in SLOW MOTION
Uh, we are driving to a very strange location somewhere I have never been, and it’s because of the woman in the back seat. This is Dianna, ‘Physics Girl.’ Yeah, uh, we are gonna go get a consultation for something very special right now. It is… Look, I’m …
Safari Live - Day 206 | National Geographic
This program features live coverage of an African safari and may include animal kills and caucuses. Viewer discretion is advised. Good afternoon and welcome to a stripey start to our sunset Safari on a rather windy afternoon. It is a little bit breezy, Ar…
Terminal prepositions | The parts of speech | Grammar | Khan Academy
Hello, Garans. Today I want to talk about ending sentences with prepositions, and I want to tell you straight up—it is totally okay. Like, it is perfectly grammatically correct and sensible and fine to end sentences with prepositions in English. And if yo…
Highest Resolution Machu Picchu Picture Ever Taken- Smarter Every Day 66
Hey, it’s me Destin. Welcome back to Smarter Every Day! So today, we’re in Peru. It’s pretty awesome. We’ve assembled a team of people, and we’re going to capture Machu Picchu in the highest resolution photo that’s ever been made of it. We’re gonna let yo…
Panda School: (EXCLUSIVE) How the National Zoo Trains Its Panda Cub | National Geographic
I’m one of a very select group of people to get to interact with this animal, and I don’t take that for granted. It’s really cool for me to get to do something like that. Beibei is just absolutely a joy to work with. There is something about him; he’s so …
Revealing My ACTUAL Net Worth
What’s up you guys, it’s Graham here. So I felt like doing something a little bit different today, and instead of the normal investing related content, I’m gonna be using myself as an example and breaking down in detail my net worth for every single year …