Meet Gullzilla: prehistoric sea bird had a beak full of teeth and a record 6.4-metre wingspan

Scientists on Wednesday said they have found the remains of a giant prehistoric sea bird that lived 50 million years ago in Antarctica and had the largest wingspan of any bird ever recorded.

Paleontologists at a natural history museum in Argentina said they had identified the pelagornithid, or bony-toothed bird, nearly three years after its fossilised bones were first found at an Argentine research base on the Antarctic island of Marambio.

“Almost three years ago, remains began to appear of what we believed could be this bird. Then we found a bone that confirmed that it was a pelagornithid,” an extinct family of enormous seabirds, said Carolina Acosta Hospitaleche, a researcher on the project.

The bird’s wings, fully extended, spanned more than 6.4 meters, she said.

Her colleague Marcos Cenizo, the director of the Natural Sciences Museum of La Pampa, said the bird was the largest pelagornithid specimen ever found.

“The shape of their wings allowed them to glide and cross large distances across the oceans,” he said.