Some UFO enthusiasts speculate that the “screw” might have been left behind by alien visitors to the Earth millions of years ago. But some critics have wondered aloud at the technologically “advanced civilization” that uses “screws” to hold advanced spaceship parts together.
The Russian UFO research group, Kosmopoisk, first announced discovery of the 300-million-year-old screw embedded inside a rock in the 1990s. And since then mainstream scientists have struggled to explain it away as a natural phenomenon.
Kosmopoisk (“All-Russian Research Public Organization”), also known as Spacesearch, specializes in UFOlogy, cyptozoology and other off-beat research pursuits. The organization was founded in Russia in 1980, and has since grown into an international organization.
The group conducts expeditions to remote sites on Earth in search for evidence of alien presence or activity, and cryptozoological species, such as Bigfoot or Almas.
Kosmopoik researchers found the “screw” while visiting the Kaluga region of Russia to locate the site of an asteroid impact that occurred in 1990s.
While searching for evidence of the fallen asteroid, the researchers found a rock that appeared to have remains of a metallic screw embedded in it.
The alleged screw measured about an inch in length.
According to the website Ancient Code, the Kosmopoik Group researchers said the screw was composed of metal.
“Geologists estimated the age of the rock to be about 300-320 million years, older than the existence of dinosaurs. Evidence shows that iron atoms of the screw and the silicon atoms of the rock have in fact spread and fused, suggesting that the screw is by no means a recent addition to the rock.”
Tests conducted on the rock in which the “screw” was embedded found that it was formed around the screw about 300 million years ago, implying that the “screw” was at least 300 million years old.
X-ray examination of the rock found another “screw” was inside the rock.
However, mainstream scientists called to give expert opinion on the nature of the alleged “ancient screw” said they have based their judgment only on photos of the rock made available to them and that they have not had the opportunity to examine the rock physically. They said that based on the photos that were made available to them the screw is very likely the fossil of a type of sea creature known as a crinoid that lived millions of years ago.
Crinoids were common in the seas in Triassic Period of the Mesozoic Era about 200 million years ago. Several species went through mass extinction at the end of the Permian Period of the Mesozoic Era. But other forms still populate the oceans.
In response to claims by some scientists that the “screw” is very likely the fossilized remains of an ancient crinoid, UFO researchers said that apart from the evidence that the screw is metallic, it is different from crinoid fossils that have been found, being much larger, according to the website Ancient Code.
The reader may compare the photo of the alleged “screw” with those of crinoid fossils that have been found (see photos below) and make his own independent conclusion. But UFOlogists insist that the crinoid remains may look similar but they are different from the 300-million-year-old “screw” in size and composition.
However, some scientists note that there were hundreds of species of crinoids with different physical features.
While UFO believers continue to claim that the “ancient screw” is evidence of ancient technological civilization millions of years old, mainstream scientists dismiss the claim.
Weighing in on the matter, a UFO expert, Nigel Watson, author of UFO Investigations Manual, told the Daily Mail, “Lots of out-of-place artifacts have been reported, such as nails or even tools embedded in ancient stone. Some of these reports are interpretations of natural formations. In this case skeptics claim the screw is nothing more than the fossilized remains of a crinoid marine animal, while believers note that the screw is very different from the surrounding fossil evidence.
“It would be great to think we could find such ancient evidence of a spaceship visiting us so long ago, but we have to consider whether extra-terrestrial spacecraft builders would use screws in the construction of their craft.
“It also seems that this story is probably a hoax that is being spread by the internet, and reflects our desire to believe that extra-terrestrials have visited us in the past and are still visiting us today in what we now call UFOs.”
Coincidentally, crinoids have inspired concepts of alien morphology in some sci-fi movies, such as the 1979 movie, Alien.
