A nine-year-old girl named Molly Sampson informed her mother she was “searching for a Meg” when visiting Calvert Beach in Maryland on Christmas Day.
That’s exactly what she discovered while wading into knee-deep water: a tooth from the now-extinct Otodus megalodon shark species.
The curator of a nearby marine museum described it as a “once-in-a-lifetime kind of find.”
Megalodon, ancient Greek for “big tooth” was a marine mammal that existed for at least 3.5 million years before going extinct.
The species was not only the largest shark in the world, but also one of the largest fish ever to exist, growing to a length of more than 66 feet (20 meters).
According to her mother Alicia Sampson, who posted the discovery on Facebook, the tooth Molly discovered was 5in long and the size of her hand.
Mrs. Sampson said her daughters, Molly and Natalie Sampson wanted to “go sharks tooth hunting like professionals” and they requested insulated chest waders for Christmas.
Mrs. Sampson described her daughter’s discovery, saying, “She told me she was wading in knee deep water when she saw it and dove in to get it,” She claimed that while getting her arms completely wet was worthwhile.
Molly had discovered over 400 considerably smaller teeth on her own, and her husband had been looking for fossils in the area since he was a young boy, but neither had ever ever across a tooth this size.
The family brought the teeth to the Calvert Marine Museum, where the paleontology division identified the shark and posted a Facebook message of congratulations to the “future paleontologist.”
Stephen Godfrey, the paleontology curator of the museum, warned that people shouldn’t assume that teeth like this one are typical along Calvert Cliffs.
“And she didn’t have to dig into the cliffs to find the tooth, it was out in the water.”
