Boy finds woolly mammoth carcass in Siberia

MOSCOW, Oct. 4 (UPI) -- An 11-year-old boy in Russia has discovered the almost-complete 30,000-year-old carcass of a woolly mammoth, Russian media reported.

Yevgeny Salinder found the 1,100-pound mammoth in the tundra of the Taymyr peninsula in northern Russia, Moscow News said.

Scientists using axes and steam hoses worked for a week to dig it out of the permafrost it's been encased in for centuries.

Woolly mammoths have been found in the permafrost in Siberia since at least 1929, but this is one of the best preserved with tusks, mouth and rib cage almost completely intact, NewScientist.com reported.

The mammoth is informally being called Zhenya, Yevgeny's nickname, but is officially the Sopkarga mammoth.

Paleontologists in Moscow and St. Petersburg plan to study the mammoth before it is returned to the Taymyr Natural History Museum for permanent display.