![]() Evidently, this generation is the one who became film directors because of Steven Spielberg. ![]() As a giant prehistoric shark, it combines the audience-pleasing qualities of dinosaurs, sharks, and giant monsters in general. However, in low grade schlock movies, it will be uncovered after being frozen in ice or lurking in deep-sea trenches and go on a superhunting rampage, tracking down our intrepid heroes all over the world before eating Boeing 747's in a single bite while flying. The rise of prehistoric orca whales was even more pressure.Įnvironmental factors in tandem with competition from newer, faster predators likely worked to drive the biggest predatory fish of all time extinct. Preying on the same food sources, great whites were faster, grew up quicker, smarter, and could handle colder water better thanks to a more efficient heating system. No not something bigger, but a type of mako shark evolved into the modern great white shark around this same time. It might have also itself been subject to pressure by a Threatening Shark. Another, more recent theory is that megalodon is just another casualty of radiation released by a supernova (or series of such) 2.6 million years ago, which was particularly deadly to the largest of animals and to animals which lived in shallow water. The cause of this living war machine's extinction is heatly debated even to this day, but one of the leading theories is that it went extinct due to the closing of the Central American Seaway, the migratory, breeding, and hunting grounds of it and its prey. The only rival it had as the top predator was a contemporary predatory whale Livyatan that was roughly the same size. It was an extremely fast swimmer (many paleontologists speculate anywhere between 5-7 meters a second at max speed), had an army of 276 serrated teeth, most the size of a human hand nested in its 10-foot-diameter mouth, had a bite force twice the strength of a Tyrannosaurus rex, and would likely split a school bus sized whale in half with one bite. It was like a Physical God of the animal kingdom, known by many as the Superboss of the entire Selachimorpha clade (which included every shark to ever evolved). An apex predator that reigned for 13 million years, it specialized in killing marine mammals with a focus on medium sized baleen whales. Otodus megalodon ("big, ear-shaped tooth") lived from 15.9 to 2.6 million years ago, was at least 15m long at the very minimum and probably could grow up to 20 meters (Making it two-thirds the size of a large modern blue whale), weighed 50-70 tons, making it the largest shark that ever lived along with being one of the largest apex predators of all time. What happens when you combine Threatening Shark with Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever, and Prehistoric Monster? You get this monstrosity. ![]() We know that megalodon had become extinct by the end of the Pliocene (2.6 million years ago), when the planet entered a phase of global cooling.We're gonna need a bigger boat. Wide – enough to swallow two adult people side-by-side. ![]() Lined with 276 teeth, megalodon jaws spanned 2.7 by 3.4 metres It is estimated to bite down with a force of between 10.8 to 18.2 tonnes.įossilised whale bones found with cut marks of megalodon teeth –some even having tips of teeth broken off – are evidence that the pre-historic shark would have eaten animals as large as humpback whales. Studies reconstructing the shark's bite force suggest it may have been one of the most powerful predators ever to have lived.Īccording to a work by a team of researchers led by Stephen Wroeįrom the University of New South Wales, published in the Journal of Zoology in 2008, the largest great whites have a bite force of up to 18 tonnes, three times that of an African lion and 20 times harder than a human bites. Most of our knowledge about megalodon comes from its enormous teeth, which which can reach up to 18cm long. A super-shark that swam in the oceans 2.6 million years ago, megalodon was three times bigger than the largest great white, making the prehistoric fish one of the most fearsome predators of all time. ![]()
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