Saudi Gazette report

RIYADH — Within 100 working days in 2022, the Saudi Geological Survey (SGS) has announced fossil discoveries in areas in Saudi Arabia, whose ages ranged between 80 and 11 million years.

It stated that its team of fossil exploration and the study of ancient life discovered these fossils during its work at the beginning of February.

The SGS has confirmed that these discoveries indicate the existence of fossil sites in the Kingdom that will be developed in the future as tourist attractions within the scope of the Red Sea development projects.

It indicated that it discovered fossil sites that contain the remains of extinct marine animals in the Azlam Formation in the Tabuk region along the Red Sea coast between the governorates of Duba and Umluj.

The Red Sea and Amala project areas contain fossils of different types of vertebrates and invertebrates, in addition to the remains of plants that lived in shallow and coastal marine environments.

Their age dates back to the ages of middle (Mesozoic) and modern (Neogene) geological life, namely Cretaceous and Miocene.

The SGS said that some of these fossils belong to marine reptiles that were found buried in the sediments of the late Cretaceous period and were identified as mosasaurs and plesiosaurs.

It is worth mentioning that mosasaurs are considered marine reptiles that lived in the Mesozoic era, and differ in their characteristics from the plesiosaurs in that they have a huge cylindrical body like crocodiles.

The characteristics of plesiosaurs are that their skulls are small, their necks are rectangular, and their flat bodies are slender.

Fossil samples were also extracted from the Eocene sediments, up to 45 million years old, the SGS said, adding that the samples that were known are: the thoracic vertebrae of extinct marine mammals similar to dugongs that take warm shallow waters as a living environment, to feed on seaweeds.

Moreover, parts of turtles and crocodile limbs were discovered. SGS stated that it was found that they lived in the coastal areas when the Tethys Sea covered most of the Arabian Peninsula.

This is an era of geological history estimated at about 20 million years before the opening of the Red Sea and the separation of the Arab plate from the African.

An exploratory research team for fossils in the Al-Rasharashiyah Formation in Al-Jouf region, located in northern Saudi Arabia, was able to explore a rare type of a ‘Giant Eocene Whale’, which used to take the warm waters of the Tethys Sea as an ideal environment for breeding.

The SGS explained that the length of the discovered whale ranged from 18 to 20 meters from the front of its head to the end of its tail.

SGS indicated that the vertebrates that the team found were 48 in width, indicating that this type of whale might be "Basilosaurus", which is considered a marine mammal and is the largest of the Eocene whales.

As for the fossil site in Asfan, which is from the early Eocene epoch which is part of the Tertiary Period in the Cenozoic Era, the explorers found the remains of shark teeth, lyre fish, vertebrates of crocodile and parts of turtle skeletons.

The SGS said that these fossils are considered to be the link between several fossil sites from the governorate of Turbah Al-Taif, passing through Huda Al-Sham and all the way to Asfan and Al-Ghula.

It is worth mentioning that the Sur-Asfan fossil site was formed about 55 million years ago, from the lower Eocene era, and is located northwest of Asfan Governorate, near the Red Sea. Its length extends for more than one kilometer, while its thickness is from six to nine meters, and its height is approximately 11 meters, as a maximum.

The fossil area consists of calcareous deposits dominated by dolomitic and the Phosphogluconate pigments. It is also characterized by the presence of large quantities of bivalves fossils (Cardita genus), as well as vertebrate fossils of cartilaginous and bony fish, as well as the remains of skeletons of turtles and crocodiles.

It clarified that the layers of this geological section were originally deposited, and after tens of millions of years and with the opening of the Red Sea, the earth movements accompanying the separation of the Arabian Peninsula from Africa affected the production of this geological structure.

The SGS confirmed that the fossil exploration team at the Survey and Excavation Center at the Commission continues its research work in various regions around Saudi Arabia, in order to explore more fossils that have been extinct since ancient times.