Construction work helps span hole in region's fossil timeline Prehistoric: A fossilised fish. A routine construction job has uncovered the 50-million-year-old fossilised remains of a five-metre crocodile in a discovery hailed as "utterly unique to science." Workers were drilling holes as part of a $100 million rail overpass in Brisbane about a fortnight ago when the crocodile remains as well as frogs, fish and plant fossils were detected in the "spoil," the oil shale rock and soil found in the excavation pit. Queensland Museum chief executive Professor Suzanne Miller described the find as incredible for Queensland and Australia. "This is utterly unique to science," she said. To find this variety of plants and animals that were alive and co-existing 50 million years ago is phenomenal. Geologically, around the world there will be a lot of interest in the fossils that have been found. The fossils, about 50 million years old, include a vertebra from the lumbar region of an ancient crocodile that was about five-metres long. The ancient crocodile was an "amazing find," the museum's senior curator of ancient environments Dr Scott Hocknull said. "The bone that we have found so far is from the vertebra of the backbone," he said. When you compare that to a modern-day crocodile, you are looking at something of the order of five metres long. Professor Miller said the fossils came from the time after the extinction of the dinosaurs and before Australia's megafauna had evolved. "It really is a bit of a missing gap in the scientific record about how animals evolved after that massive extinction that killed off the majority of animals on the planet," she said. This is a snapshot back in time 50 million years ago when this was all tropical rainforest. Brisbane Lord Mayor Graham Quirk said it would be appropriate to represent the important fossil find in the final design of the overpass in the future. Work will not stop at the overpass at Geebung in northern Brisbane, but the community has been asked to help sift through 30 cubic metres of dirt to search for more fossils.