An international team of scientists has discovered the fossilized remains of the largest snake known to have lived - a monster that weighed more than 1,000 kilograms and was about the size of a bus, at around 13 meters in length.
The researchers say the boa-like creature roamed the rainforests of what is now northern Colombia some 60 million years ago, when the world was far warmer than it is now.
The scientists who found the remains named the creature, Titanoboa cerrejonensiss, titanic boa from Cerrejon, after the open-pit coal mine where the bones were discovered.
They say the gigantic snake probably munched on crocodiles and lived like modern anacondas, spending most of its time in the water and wrapping itself around its unfortunate prey.
The discovery breaks the record for snake length by about three meters, surpassing that of a creature that lived about 40 million years ago in Egypt.
The longest of today's snakes is a python measuring about nine meters.
The scientists' findings have been published in the journal Nature.
Some information for this report was provided by AFP, AP and Reuters.