The Mammoth Pirates – In Russia's Arctic north, a new kind of gold rush (rferl.org)

Oof

Anthrax spores blasted out of the permafrost at pressure. It really seems like sooner or later, who could have guessed that this activity came with a curse?

I wonder how easy it would be to counterfeit a mammoth tusk

A summer away from one's family, doing hard work in the mud, eating highly processed food from cans and drinking tons of alcohol sounds like a real blast of a time for young men if not for the mosquitoes and questionable economics of it all.

It sucks that they'd destroying the land and the rivers but that's not new. Hopefully they find some equilibrium that legalizes what they're up to that maximizes the upside and minimizes the damage like more mature resource extraction industries do.

I understand that the carved mammoth's tusks can be worth millions, but

> The market for powdered rhino horn in Vietnam is partly due to a belief it can cure cancer. By the time it reaches Vietnam, the horn will be worth more than its weight in gold.

So they even sell based on myths and legends? What insanity. I thought museums would pay for this. Not to mention the work an life conditions in these remote regions of Russia. This is one hell of a documentary.

I don't know when this article was written, but this is nothing "new" - it's been going on for years.

Does this affect archeological or any other scientific efforts negatively? Or is it the same as selling fossils online as souvenirs for couple dozen dollars? Well except the prices are in 6 digits and there's a seemingly considerable ecological impact

How are "mammoth pirates" newsworthy compared to a 20 year concerted campaign to reopen the US Arctic Oil drilling ? that is now reopening?

look - over there!

The fact that many in China value ivory is not unusual, in that different cultures value different things that have no productive value. How did ivory, which is valued in many places, become so much more valued by many in China?