Storm Hannah, which struck Wales and left a trail of devastation behind on April 27, also revealed the fossilized remains of a 4,500-year-old prehistoric forest that lay buried under sand and water.
The forest of Borth covered two to three miles on the Welsh shore of Cardigan Bay. It was buried under layers of peat, sand, and seawater around 4,000-6,000 years ago, according to The Daily Mail.
The storm and a low tide uncovered fossilized tree stumps of pine, alder, oak, and birch trees.
@WendyJLewis Mythical ‘Sunken Kingdom’ of Wales rises again: Storm Hannah unearths petrified prehistoric forest that inspired ancient legend of the Lost Hundred after thousands of years buried on a Welsh beach
via https://t.co/Csrmt8C6Eq https://t.co/6OaMF93KPp— Fremen65 #Brexit (@fremen65) May 22, 2019
“The trees really are stunning. It’s breathtaking that these trees were part of a Bronze Age forest that extended almost to Ireland but have not been seen for thousands of years,” Wayne Lewis, an amateur photographer, told Daily Mail. Lewis was roaming around the beach when he first saw the fossilized forest.
“It first emerged in 2014, but was then partially recovered, and usually, you are only able to see the tips of the tree stumps. It seems it has been uncovered again recently.
“I don’t know for sure, but it is probably due to a combination of ‘Storm Hannah’ with the 80 mph+ winds last month, and the tides have been very low, making more of the forest visible,” he said.
Links With Mythical Sunken Kingdom
The prehistoric forest has been linked with the 17th-century legend of a sunken civilization called the Cantre’r Gwaelod, or the Sunken Hundred, according to the BBC.
The legend says that the land stretching across 20 miles was fertile once upon a time, and was protected by flood gates.
Legend says that the land was lost to floods when Mererid, the priestess of a fairy well, neglected her duties and the well overflowed.
Some people claim that even today they can hear the ringing bells of the drowned church of Cantre’r Gwaelod.
Many other archaeological objects have also been uncovered from the area in recent years—including fossilized animal- and human-footprints, and human tools.
Scientists Uncover Fossils From Day of Asteroid Strike That Wiped Out Dinosaurs
A heap of fossils discovered under the rocky North Dakota landscape may shed light on what happened the day an asteroid struck our planet, wiping out the dinosaurs and nearly all life. The mass-extinction event also resulted in what’s known as the Chicxulub Crater, located on the southern side of the Gulf of Mexico.
The event is cited as the most cataclysmic event ever to befall planet Earth.
A motley combination of land and sea fossils were found bundled together at a single site near Tanis. The team of scientists from the University of Kansas, who excavated the site, included Robert DePalma, a Ph.D. student in geology who works at the Natural History Museum.
DePalma said huge standing waves, called seiches, carried various organisms inland and deposited them. This was not caused by a tsunami, DePalma said; rather, it was the result of seismic waves from the seaway, and occurred just minutes after the asteroid’s impact.
“A partially exposed, perfectly preserved 65-million-year-old fish from the Tanis deposit” (Photo courtesy of Robert DePalma/University of Kansas)
“Intertangled mass of articulated fish from the Tanis inundation surge deposit” (Photo courtesy of Robert DePalma/University of Kansas)“A tsunami would have taken at least 17 or more hours to reach the site from the crater, but seismic waves—and a subsequent surge—would have reached it in tens of minutes,” said DePalma.
It is believed that the seismic waves radiating outward from the impact zone caused walls of water 10 meters high (33 feet) that carried a jumble of both aquatic and terrestrial life inland. Although several fish species were found, including some new species, there were no dinosaur fossils at the site in Tanis.
Epoch Times reporter Michael Wing contributed to this report.
