Cerro Ballena

Cerro Ballena (lit. "Whale Hill") is a Chilean Late Miocene palaeontological site hosting remains of cetaceans.[1][2] It is located in the Atacama Desert along the Pan-American Highway a few kilometers north of the port of Caldera.[3] Besides cetaceans Cerro Ballena does also contains fossils of pinnipeds, sailfishes, aquatic sloths and marine invertebrate as well as trace fossils.[2][4] It has about 40 cetacean individuals all of them in relatively good state.[4] The cetaceans appear to have died at different times but due to the same causes: poisoning by toxins secreted by algae.[4] The site was discovered in 2011 and is protected by law since 2012.[2][4] It hosts an investigation centre.[2]

Adult and juvenile rorqual fossil skeletons.[1]

As of February 2014 scientists from Brazil, Chile and the United States were studying the site.[4]

Geologically Cerro Ballena is part of the Cerro Ballena Member of Bahía Inglesa Formation.[5]


See also

References
  1. Pyenson, N. D.; Gutstein, C. S.; Parham, J. F.; Le Roux, J. P.; Carreño Chavarría, C.; Little, H.; Adam Metallo, A.; Rossi, V.; Valenzuela-Toro, A. M.; Velez-Juarbe, J.; Santelli, C. M.; Rubilar Rogers, D.; Cozzuol, M. A. and Suárez, M. A. (2014). "Repeated mass strandings of Miocene marine mammals from Atacama Region of Chile point to sudden death at sea". Proceedings of the Royal Society B, 281(1781): 20133316
  2. Yacimiento Paleontológico Cerro Ballena (in Spanish), Sociedad Geológica de Chile, retrieved May 30, 2014
  3. "About", Cerro Ballena, retrieved June 2, 2014
  4. "Científicos explican tragedia que creó cementerio de ballenas en medio del desierto chileno", Radio Bío-Bío (in Spanish), February 26, 2014, retrieved May 30, 2014
  5. Le Roux, Jacobus; Achurra, Luciano; Henríquez, Álvaro; Carreño, Catalina; Rivera, Huber; Suárez, Mario E.; Ishman, Scott E.; Pyenson, Nicholas D.; Gutstein, Carolina S. (2016). "Oroclinal bending of the Juan Fernández Ridge suggested by geohistory analysis of the Bahía Inglesa Formation, north-central Chile". Sedimentary Geology. 333: 32–49. doi:10.1016/j.sedgeo.2015.12.003.

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