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Whale of a Find Adapted from Information by Engineers Australia A drilling crew working on a project in Quindalup, Australia, made an unexpect- ed find when they encountered a giant whale bone which could be thousands of years old. The bone was discovered buried at a depth of over 13 feet during the drilling of a manhole as part of Water Corporation’s Infill Sewerage Program, which allows residents to connect to the central wastewater system, reducing the risks to the environment related to the use of old septic tanks. As soon as the crew realized what they had unearthed, work was stopped and experts from the Western Australian (WA) Museum were contacted for advice. “It’s not every day you make such an interesting discovery when working on one of our projects, and everyone was pretty excited to find something so unexpected,” said Water Corporation Assets Delivery General Manager Nathan Hardwick. “We have now handed over the whale bone to the WA Museum to clean and restore, so it can be accessioned into its collection.” WA Museum Earth and Planetary Sciences Head of Department Mikael Siversson said, “The soft sand in which the bone was found, its comparatively lightweight, and lack of cemented shell fragments indi- cate the rib originates from the Holocene period, which is the current geological age, and began about 11,600 years ago. At the end of the last cold glacial period, often called the Ice Age, the global sea level rose rapidly reaching its current level roughly 8000 years ago. This date gives us a probable maximum age for the bone.” As part of the WA Museum’s quarantine protocol, the bone will stay in a freezer for about three weeks before it is cleaned and examined. The museum will study the bone to see if it has any marks, including possible bite marks from sharks. Following examination, the bone will be assigned a WA Museum number and become part of the Vertebrate Fossils collection. The museum only had a few sub- fossil whale bone specimens before the addition of this partial rib bone. S Water Well Equipmen Skyrex t Equipment CenterLatchEleva vators tors R y k Crosso Spiders Manual Drill C Drill P PVC and ver Subs Tongs ollars ipe Heavy-Duty Ele Offered office x e El with or without a bas fax Family evators e www re Owned & Operat Etc. Bits Stabili RC Swiv xmcfadden c Ou W ed zers els om r Troops! e Support . . 37 WorldWide Drilling Resource ® JUNE 2019 WTR Have an article idea? Submit it to us today. Call Bonnie at 850-547-0102 or e-mail bonnie@ worldwidedrillingresource.com