Original paper
The Messel Pit Fossil Site – a UNESCO Natural World Heritage Site
Wedmann, Sonja; Schaal, Stephan
Schriftenreihe der Deutschen Gesellschaft für Geowissenschaften Heft 66 (2010), p. 99 - 100
11 references
published: May 28, 2010
ArtNo. ESP171906600060, Price: 8.00 €
Abstract
The Messel Pit Fossil Site is located on the eastern side of the Rhine rift valley in Germany, about 20 km southeast of Frankfurt and 8 km northeast of Darmstadt. Presently, the site is a former open cast mine with a diameter of about 0.7 km x 1 km and a depth of about 60 m. Messel is famous for the exceptional preservation of the fossils (Schaal & Ziegler 1992, Koenigswald & Storch 1998, Vernissage Verlag 2005). In the middle of the 19th century, bog iron ore and later brown coal and oilshale were discovered in the area of today’s Messel Pit. In the late 19th century the browncoal and then the oil shale was exploited by a mining company. At the same time, the first fossils were discovered, the first crocodile being described in 1877. The oilshale was industrially used till 1971. After the mining stopped, plans to turn the former quarry into a waste disposal were made. However, severe protests by the public and by scientists resulted in the preservation of the Messel Pit (Schaal & Schneider 1995). Since 1995 the Messel Pit Fossil site is inscribed on the world heritage list of the UNESCO.
Keywords
Rhine rift valley • Germany • cast mine • fossils • claystone sediments