Emily Chan
Over fifty million years ago, a “monster” penguin species inhabited New Zealand. These birds were triple the size of modern penguins, stood as tall as humans, and weighed as much as adult gorillas.
Scientists found the fossilized bones of the giant penguin in boulders on the beach of North Otago, located in New Zealand’s South Island.
“Our new species, Kumimanu fordycei, is the largest fossil penguin ever discovered—at approximately 350 pounds, it would have weighed more than Shaquille O’Neal at the peak of his dominance,” said the study’s co-author, Dr. Daniel Field, from the University of Cambridge.
The penguin is called Kumimanu fordycei. The first part of the name translates to “monster bird,” while “fordycei” is in honor of Dr. Ewan Fordyce, who has played an instrumental role in helping the paleontology program in New Zealand become what it is today.
The penguin is thought to have lived around five to ten million years after the extinction event that annihilated all the non-avian dinosaurs.
When the bones became visible in the rocks, scientists were able to create digital models of them with the help of laser scanners. Then, they compared the bones to several modern penguin species.
After calculating the dimensions of the new species’ flipper bone to predict its weight, they found that the giant penguin was significantly heavier than an emperor penguin, which is the tallest and heaviest penguin alive today.
According to Dr. Field, the remains of penguins are the most well-preserved out of any other species of bird because they had stronger, denser bones.
A second, smaller penguin species was also unearthed from the same area. It weighed about 110 pounds and was named Petradyptes stonehousei, after the late Dr. Bernard Stonehouse, who made major strides in the field of penguin biology. He was the first person to document the emperor penguin’s full breeding cycle.
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