Isle of Wight: Enormous fossil ammonite dug out from boulder

The huge fossil is thought to be a rare Epicheloniceras ammonite

A giant fossil ammonite has been recovered from a fallen boulder on a beach.

The edge of the creature's shell was spotted in the block by fossil collector Jack Wonfor on the Isle of Wight's southwest coast.

Fossil enthusiasts from across the island came together to painstakingly extract the fossil, which weighs over 150kg (24 stone), from the boulder.

It was hauled up from the remote beach via a make-shift sled and rope system.

Jack Wonfor spotted an initial edge of the ammonite exposed from the rock

It took several attempts for Mr Wonfor, along with friends and fellow fossil collectors, to get the weighty fossil off the beach, up onto the clifftop and into a car.

The 23-year-old palaeontology student at the University of Portsmouth and fossil guide at Wight Coast Fossils said he was "super happy to have it off the beach safely and saved from the destruction of the sea".

It took over a week from first finding the fossil to extract it from the boulder and get it off the beach

Wight Coast Fossils said the "near on perfect example" was thought to be a "huge and rare Epicheloniceras ammonite".

Once it has been fully cleaned up it ill be donated to the Dinosaur Isle Museum in Sandown.

The giant mollusc had to be dragged and hauled from the beach up to the clifftop and into a car

Ammonites are closely related to modern-day squid, cuttlefish and octopuses.

They lived during Jurassic and Cretaceous times. They became extinct at roughly the same time as the dinosaurs disappeared.

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