This is the online edition of In the Beginning: Compelling Evidence for Creation and the Flood
(7th Edition) by Dr. Walt Brown. The online version of the book is designed to be read online.
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Theories Attempting to Explain Frozen Mammoths
Ten theories have been proposed to explain the frozen mammoth puzzle. Each will be described below as an advocate would.
Fruitful theories answer not only the obvious, initial questions but also solve perplexing and seemingly unrelated problems. As we unravel the frozen mammoth mystery, we may answer broader questions and even uncover a sequence of dramatic, global events.
Robust theories also provide details that generate surprising and testable predictions. Keep this in mind as we examine all ten explanations. With each, ask yourself, “What predictions can this theory make?” If few predictions are forthcoming, the theory is probably weak.116 If theories could not be published unless they included numerous details and specific predictions, we would be mercifully spared many distractions and false ideas.
Hydroplate Theory. [For a more complete description of the hydroplate theory, read pages 106–139.] The rupture of the earth’s crust passed between what is now Siberia and Alaska in minutes. Jetting water from the fountains of the great deep first fell as rain. During the next few hours, some of the subterranean water that went above the atmosphere, where the effective temperature is several hundred degrees below zero Fahrenheit,118 fell as hail. Some animals were suddenly buried, suffocated, frozen, and compressed by tons of cold, muddy ice crystals from the gigantic “hail storm.” Dirt in this ice prevented it from floating as the flood waters submerged these regions after days and weeks. Blankets of muddy, supercold ice, hundreds of feet thick, insulated and preserved many animals during the flood phase. As the topmost layers of ice melted, the dirt in that ice remained and settled—blanketing and further insulating the deeper ice and buried animals.
After mountains were suddenly pushed up, the earth’s balance shifted, the earth “rolled,” so Siberia and Alaska moved from temperate latitudes (similar to south-central Canada and central United States today) to their present positions. [For details, see Endnote 65 on page 136.] As the flood waters drained off the continents, the icy graves in warmer climates melted, and the flesh of those animals decayed. However, many animals, buried in what are now permafrost regions, were preserved.
These conclusions can be reached quite simply. The evidence showing compression and suffocation of the frozen mammoths implies rapid burial. Rapid burial and sudden freezing suggest a supercold “ice dump.”
compression + suffocation = rapid burial
rapid burial + sudden freezing = an “ice dump”
Lake Drowning Theory.121 No catastrophe occurred. The well-preserved mammoths, with food in their stomachs and between their teeth, died suddenly, probably from asphyxiation resulting from drowning in a partially frozen lake, river, or bog. Such burials can preserve animal—and even human—tissue for thousands of years.
Crevasse Theory. Some mammoths fell into ice crevasses or deep snowdrifts. This protected them from predators, while ice preserved them for thousands of years.122
| Mammoth Myths |
Facts |
|---|---|
| 1. Fresh buttercups were in the mouth and stomach of the Berezovka mammoth. |
Its stomach contained three seeds from plants that produce delicate, yellow buttercups. Fragments of other flowers were in its stomach. No large flowers were in its mouth. |
| 2. People have been served mammoth steaks.126 |
These reports persist but are never specific enough to verify. For example, Lydekker reported that “sleigh dogs, as well as Yakuts themselves, have often made a hearty meal on mammoth flesh thousands of years old.”127 Lydekker never visited Russia, let alone Siberia. The following report by Herz appears valid. Herz wrote in his diary that the Berezovka mammoth “looks as fresh as well-frozen beef or horse meat. It looked so appetizing that we wondered for some time whether we should not taste it, but no one would venture to take it into his mouth, and horse flesh was given in the preference. The dogs cleaned up whatever mammoth meat was thrown them.”128 In 1982, construction workers in Siberia uncovered a frozen mammoth and fed it to dogs.129 |
| 3. Mammoths are encased in ice. Their preservation is complete. |
Charles Lyell popularized this myth by writing that mammoth remains are found in icebergs and frozen gravel.130 There are very few reports of complete encasement in ice.131 Other mammoths were near or partially in ice. Herz and Pfizenmayer only believed that their Berezovka mammoth was once fully encased in ice. Most frozen mammoths are found partially preserved in frozen muck or sediments. |
| 4. The mammoth’s small ears, short tail and legs, and anal flap reduced its heat loss in cold Arctic air. This shows that the mammoth was an Arctic animal. |
Animals with large ears and long tails, such as hares and foxes, survive quite well in the Arctic. The legs and tails of Arctic foxes are similar to those of foxes living in warmer climates. While a slight correlation exists between smaller ears in colder habitats, other factors play a stronger role, such as metabolic efficiency, food availability, and adjustable insulation. The African elephant also has a prominent anal flap.132 |
| 5. Mammoths used their long curved tusks to remove snow from plants they ate on the ground. Most tusks show these wear marks. |
Wild elephants live far from snow, yet they also have wear marks on their shorter, less vulnerable tusks. Mammoth tusks do not show extreme abrasion from being scraped over rocky soil in search of food under snow. (Besides, “shoveling” snow with a long, curved stick is a good way to break the stick.) A wild elephant spends about 16 hours a day eating and searching for food.133 If food were buried under snow, mammoths would not have enough hours in the day to gather sufficient food to survive. |
| 6. The curve in the mammoth tusks almost forms a circle. |
“Not one tusk in ten forms a third of a circle, not one in twenty even a semicircle.”134 Artists and museums have popularized this misconception. |
| 7. The wool on woolly mammoths protected them from the Siberian cold. |
The term “woolly” is misleading because true wool has tiny, overlapping scales that interlock and trap air, making it an excellent insulator. Unlike sheep’s wool, mammoth “wool” is only short, coarse underhair. Mammoth hair, some of it long and bristly, has relatively few fibers per square inch. |
| 8. A mammoth’s thick skin and hairy body protected it from the Arctic cold. |
See the earlier section titled “Mammoth Characteristics and Environment” on page 234. |
| 9. Mammoths were larger than today’s elephants. |
Mammoths were larger than Asian elephants, but smaller than African elephants. Usually, mammoths’ tusks and heads were larger than those of all elephants.135 |
| 10. Larger animals generate more heat per unit of body surface area. Therefore, the mammoth would stay warm, even in the Arctic winter. |
The first sentence is true. However, an Arctic mammal must avoid having its warm skin melt snow, as explained earlier. The mammoth’s skin would tend to melt snow, especially if the animal lay down. Its high ground pressure would compress and reduce the insulation provided by its hair. (Elephants doze standing up, but when they feel safe, they will lie down for a few hours of sleep.) Sick or injured mammoths, unable to stand, would probably not have survived. Young mammoths were even more vulnerable. They generated less heat per unit of body surface area and probably spent more time lying down. Newborn mammoths, wet and initially unable to walk, could not have survived for long lying on permafrost, especially if they were born during the long winter. (Elephants are born at all times of the year.) |
Mud Burial Theory. In Siberian summers, the top foot or so of tundra thaws, so larger animals, even men, can easily become stuck—standing upright. Herds of mammoths, rhinoceroses, and buffalo made summer migrations to northern Siberia and Alaska. Some became stuck in this mud; others were overwhelmed and suffocated in mudslides. Still others died for various reasons and were then buried in slow mudflows during several summer thaws. Sudden cold spells—sometimes followed by long, cold winters—froze and preserved many mammoths.123
River Transport Theory. Mammoths and other animals lived farther south in the temperate zone of Asia where food was abundant. Flooding rivers floated their remains from Central Siberia on the north flowing rivers.124
Extinction-by-Man Theory. Man exterminated mammoths, just as man almost exterminated the buffalo. Man, in hunting mammoths, pursued and pushed them north into Siberia and Alaska. There they died from harsh weather, lack of food, or the direct killing by man.125
Bering Barrier Theory. As ice accumulated on continents during the last Ice Age, sea level was lowered by 300 feet and the Bering Strait was closed. This newly created land bridge allowed people and animals, including mammoths, to migrate between Siberia and Alaska and onto Arctic islands. Because the warmer Pacific waters could no longer mix through the Bering Strait with the cold Arctic Ocean, the Pacific waters became even warmer and the Arctic waters even colder. The resulting heavy evaporation from the Pacific caused extreme snow falls on higher, colder land masses north of the Bering barrier. Mammoths and others were buried in severe snow storms early one fall. As the Ice Age ended, heavy rains washed soil down on top of compacted snow deposits, forming rock ice. Some frozen mammoths and rock ice are still preserved. Since then, glacial melting raised sea levels and reestablished the Bering Strait.136
Mild Ice Age Theory.137 During snow and dust storms about 700 years after a global flood, some mammoths were frozen, buried, suffocated, and preserved—a few standing up. Here is how it happened.
The flood waters were warm, if not hot, because they came from 3,000–10,000 feet below the earth’s crust where temperatures are 30–100°F hotter. Warm, postflood oceans produced both heavy evaporation and snow fall. As snow depths increased, the Ice Age began;138 it lasted about 700 years—until the oceans cooled sufficiently. Even at high latitudes, costal regions remained warm while thick ice sheets built up in continental interiors. During those 700 years, mammoths migrated from the mountains of Ararat to northern Siberia where their population quickly increased to about 10 million. Although ocean levels did not drop much during the mild Ice Age, a narrow and temporary land bridge was exposed at the Bering Strait, allowing mammoths to occupy North America. Warm winds off the Arctic Ocean made the climate tolerable for the ice age mammoths and other animals that today live at temperate latitudes. As the oceans cooled, fierce storms developed. Blowing dust, called loess, suffocated and buried most mammoths, some standing up. Other storms converted the dust to permafrost.
Shifting Crust Theory. Before the last Ice Age, the Hudson Bay was at the North Pole. Siberia and Alaska were farther south and supported abundant vegetation and large herds of mammoths. As vast amounts of ice accumulated at what was then the North Pole, the crust on the spinning earth became unbalanced and slid, moving Siberia northward. Because the earth is slightly flattened at the poles and bulges at the equator, the shifting crust produced many ruptures. Volcanic gas was thrown above the atmosphere where it cooled and descended as a supercold “blob.” Airborne volcanic dust lowered temperatures on earth and caused phenomenal snow storms. Mammoths and other animals living in Siberia and Alaska were suddenly frozen and buried in extremely cold snow. Some are still preserved.139
Meteorite Theory. At the end of the last Ice Age, a large iron meteorite hit earth’s atmosphere. The resulting heat temporarily melted the top layers of the frozen tundra, causing mammoths to sink into muck. Poor visibility caused others “to blunder to their deaths in icy bogs.”140