I heard on the shop floor today that the remains of an elephant have been discovered at U105 in the mining area..... This is a wow story if it proves to be true...... Imagine Elephants in the desert were not just roaming the Kaokaveld but down here in the deep south..... One wonders how many other interesting objects/finds have been lost over the decades to mining.....
Elephant remains were found at Dabaras Prospecting by Dr. Gudrun Corvenus
Some were shown in the Geology offices, mid seventies, i am sure there was an article in the newsletter those days.....
Those were remains of hippos which used to live on the river at the time.
@ Gordon
Do you also remember the Dassie head 2-3 times normal size ???
Was that housed in Doc Stocken's office? May have been the skull of one of those long haired baboons we saw on occasion in the mine. Geologist Hugh Dury showed me this skull in the Geology offices. Dave Liniker also came across hippo bones in the southern part of the mine either in G or U Area. Not sure what part.
regards
Gordon
It was next to the electrical egineers office where Iggy had his drawings
I concur, the elephant found now was way up the coast and not near a water source, the remains I have read about in previous CDm papers were Hippo's.....
Quite amazing. Would love to see pictures. And to think the elephant's closest relative is in fact the Dassie. Coincidence? affe-red
About a 90 km coincidence....
so, was there an elephant or not ????? now i am m issing out on that stuff notfair
Michael, on this topic I came across a report on the fossil vertebrates recovered from pit2/AD8 at Arrisdrift. They are listed as follows:
Catfish, Frog, Crocodile, Eagle, Giant elephant shrew, Bear-dog, Giant dassie/hyrax, Deinothere (from which evolved the true elephants), Rhinoceros, Chevrotain, Pika (mouse-hare), and Spring hare. Quite a collection. Also looks like you right about elephant remains as the Deinothere resembled a present day elephant except it had a much shorter trunk. More then 2000 fossil specimens were recovered, cleaned and repaired. What a find! More on this if you interested.
Send us all you have
That is what i was talking about from Dr Gudrun Corvenus
At home, I have a book on the Sperrgebiedt, I will scan the page with the article on the arrisdrift fossils... there's a few pics there also....
Yes please, Gordon & Mike. I'd love to know more about the fossils. I know elsewhere in Namibia there's quite a few older fossils and dinosaur footprints in rocks. Will look for it, I have pictures somewhere.
Here we go...The Arrisdrift Fossils!
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Thanx Mike, I love this kind of stuff!
Hope you're resting before the big game! woo_hoo
Mike, Bertie, Georg, this very similar to the article I discovered in the 1978 Optima publication. The article entitled 'Fossils from Arrisdrift' was indeed written by Gudrun Corvinus. It contains lots of interesting text and photos.
Intersting articles
I was befriended with Gudrun Corvinus, we had lots of talks abouts these and other things.
When in the Richtersveld, she was constantly searching in the ground for artifacts of ancient live and explained interesting finds concerning antropology
Gudrun was highly recognized on german universities,
see also the report about her murder some few years ago in the far east.
Use the search function in our forum for the report
I know only of a tusk or two (maybe more) that were found in the U105 area, these are (I assume, from other artefacts of similar nature) related to the wreck of U60. That's an opinion...
Quote from: Andrew Darné on September 23, 2008, 10:38:46 PM
I know only of a tusk or two (maybe more) that were found in the U105 area, these are (I assume, from other artefacts of similar nature) related to the wreck of U60. That's an opinion...
What's the distance between U105 and U60? I am guessing that U105 is on a north position regarding the U60..
Yes North 1 or 2 km's maybe 3
Quote from: Alfred Boehme on September 24, 2008, 07:01:44 PM
Yes North 1 or 2 km's maybe 3
Yes, it does make sense that it is part of the same wreck.
Well...if thats the case. why only one or two tusks, and not a whole "splattering" of tuskS SPREAD up the coast?
That begs for two questions: how many tusks were originally on board and how closely have we searched the seabed? :)
That was what Filipe wanted to do....dive the sea, just off the seawall........
How's the water over there? Isn't it usually agitated, with big waves?
Blerrie Cold and rough, low visibility....... with the odd tsunami......
Quote from: Alexandre on September 25, 2008, 06:08:24 AM
How's the water over there? Isn't it usually agitated, with big waves?
Not a very freindly sea I remenber as a boy when we went to the beach the the tide pulling back used to pull me of my feet
Diving the seabed won't give you all that much area, as the sea has already been pushed back beyond the wreck i.e most of the scatter is now under the beach itself and I would say even mined out already and passed through the plant without being noticed. The section of mast I identified at U105 (+/- 4 km north of the wreck site) was roughly 80 from the sea wall, and that was September 2007. That's where I came with my concern of how much area has been mined between then and April and up until now, all along the "scatter" zone. I have questioned many of the miners who worked the areas and have sufficient feedback from them to confirm my fears.
Andrew, so what you are suggesting indirectly is: take up your shovels and buckets boys and go have a day at the beach - might you be safer and luckier to find something more there than risking life and limb in the waters behind the wall?
Here is a picture of Georgswa's late friend, Gudrun,
I remember Gudrun giving us a talk at Tech the one day ..... very interesting ... vis relatives of the elephant etc , very passionate about her work she was ...