13,000-year old human footprints found off Canada’s Pacific coast

Human footprints found off Canada’s Pacific coast may be 13,000 years old, according to a study published March 28, 2018 in the open-access journal PLOS ONE by Duncan McLaren and colleagues from the Hakai Institute and University of Victoria, Canada.

Previous research suggests that, during the last ice age (which ended around 11,700 years ago), humans moved into the Americas from Asia across what was then a land bridge to North America, eventually reaching what is now the west coast of British Columbia, Canada as well as coastal regions to the south. Along the pacific coast of Canada, much of this shoreline is today covered by dense forest and only accessible by boat, making it difficult to look for the archaeological evidence which might support this hypothesis. In this study, the research team excavated intertidal beach sediments on the shoreline of Calvert Island, British Columbia, where the sea level was two to three meters lower than it is today at the end of the last ice age.

The researchers uncovered 29 human footprints of at least three different sizes in these sediments, which radiocarbon dating estimated to be around 13,000 years old. Measurements and digital photographic analyses revealed that the footprints probably belonged to two adults and a child, all barefoot. Read more.