The fossils of a giant centipede reveal “the largest insect that ever existed.”

One fossil giant centipede found on the beach in the north England, discovered “the largest insect that ever existed,” paleontologists say.

The fossil was discovered in January 2018 in a piece of sandstone that fell from a cliff at Howick Bay Beach in Northumberland. The stone shattered, revealing a fossil.

“It was a completely coincidental discovery,” said Neil Davis, professor of sedimentary geology at Cambridge University’s Department of Earth Sciences, who said the fossil was discovered by a former doctoral student.

“It was an incredibly exciting discovery, but the fossil is so large that it took four of us to carry it to the rock,” Davis continued.

The fossilized remains of this creature, dubbed Arthropleura, date back to the Carboniferous period about 326 million years ago. This was more than 100 million years before the advent of the dinosaurs.

During life, the creature was estimated to be 55 centimeters (22 in) wide and up to 2.63 meters (8.6 feet) long and weighing 50 kilograms (110 lb). This would make it the largest known invertebrate of all time – larger than the ancient sea scorpions that once held the title, the statement said. Invertebrates are animals without a backbone.

“This is definitely the biggest mistake that ever existed,” Davis confirmed via email.

This is only the third arthropleura fossil found. The other two were found in Germany and were much smaller than the new specimen.

To reach this size, they had to eat hearty food. At the time, British territory was at the equator, and invertebrates and early amphibians probably lived on vegetation that grew in a series of streams and rivers.

The researchers believe that the fossilized skeleton was likely an altered segment of the exoskeleton that was filled with sand and preserved it.

“Finding these giant centipede fossils is rare because when they die, their bodies tend to separate (separate at the joints), so it is likely that the fossil is a mute shell that the animal expelled as it grew,” added Davis … “We haven’t found the fossilized head yet, so it’s hard to know everything about them.”

Animals with arthropleura crawled for about 45 million years before becoming extinct. It is not known exactly why they disappeared, but it could be due to climate change, which did not suit them. Or it could have happened during the emergence of reptiles, which began to dominate the same habitat.

The fossil will be presented to the public at the Sedgwick Museum in Cambridge in 2022. The study was published in the Journal of the Geological Society.