Chilean customs officials seized more than 200 extinct ammonite fossils on Friday, September 25, 2026, after finding them concealed in a shipping container that originated in Madagascar and transited through China to the port of San Antonio.
The shipment had been falsely declared as ordinary household items, including glass ornaments, pendants, and chains.
Experts from the San Antonio Museum of Natural History inspected the cargo and confirmed the specimens were genuine prehistoric fossils estimated to be 110 million years old.
Fossils Concealed in Everyday Packaging
According to Chile's National Customs Directorate, the contraband was hidden inside ordinary packaging materials to evade border inspection during transit.
"Protected species discovered by Customs arrived in cardboard boxes, wrapped in newspapers and magazines from Madagascar," the agency said in a statement.
Ammonites are ancient marine mollusks closely related to modern octopuses and squids.
They populated global oceans until going extinct roughly 66 million years ago during the Cretaceous-Paleogene extinction event, the same catastrophe that wiped out non-avian dinosaurs.
Following the verification by paleontological experts, Chilean authorities initiated diplomatic communications with Madagascar's government.
The talks aim to verify the official origin of the shipment and determine whether the African nation will request the formal repatriation of the artifacts.
