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Mikhail Polyakov

The giant snake Vasuki indicus from India: how a length of up to 15 metres was estimated from 27 vertebrae and why these numbers need a caveat

Level: BeginnerReading time: 6 min

Topics: Science

A row of large sandstone-coloured fossil vertebrae laid out in a curving line on dark cloth beside a palaeontologist brush and a plain wooden ruler

Short answer: scientists from India described the fossil snake Vasuki indicus, which lived about 47 million years ago, and estimated its length at between 10.9 and 15.2 metres. By the upper estimate this is on a par with Titanoboa, which until now was considered the largest known snake. But the authors themselves see great uncertainty in this estimate: there is no complete skeleton, only 27 vertebrae, and two methods of calculation give noticeably different numbers. The study itself came out in 2024, and on 14 October 2026 ScienceDaily told about it again. Below is what was found, how the length was calculated and which conclusions remain assumptions.

What was found

There is one source: the ScienceDaily article dated 14 October 2026. This is a retelling; I did not read the scientific paper itself.

  • Who and where. The palaeontologists Debajit Datta and Sunil Bajpai from the Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee identified the species from remains from the Panandhro coal mine in the Kutch district of Gujarat state, in western India.
  • When the snake lived. The remains date to the Middle Eocene, about 47 million years ago, when the Earth's climate was noticeably warmer than today.
  • What exactly was found. The researchers studied 27 fossil vertebrae. Many were well preserved, and some remained connected as they had been in the body. According to the text, the bones apparently belonged to an adult animal. There is no complete skeleton.
  • Size of the bones. Individual vertebrae were from 37.5 to 62.7 millimetres long and from 62.4 to 111.4 millimetres wide. The broad shape, according to the authors, indicates a thick, cylindrical body able to carry great weight.
  • The name. The species is named after the mythical serpent Vasuki, associated with the Hindu god Shiva, and the second part of the name points to India.
  • Where it was published. According to the text, the discovery was described in 2024 in the journal Scientific Reports.

How the length was estimated

To estimate the length of the whole body, the researchers compared the fossil vertebrae with the vertebrae of modern snakes whose body length is known. Two methods gave two estimates: from 10.9 to 12.2 metres (from 36 to 40 feet) by one and from 14.5 to 15.2 metres (from 48 to 50 feet) by the other. The overall range given by ScienceDaily is from 10.9 to 15.2 metres.

For comparison: Titanoboa lived in the area of present-day Colombia about 60 million years ago, and its length is thought to have reached about 13 metres (43 feet). So the lower estimate for Vasuki is smaller than this figure and the upper one larger. The authors warn that the calculations contain considerable uncertainty: different methods can give very different estimates, especially when an animal is reconstructed from an incomplete backbone. It remains unclear whether Vasuki actually exceeded Titanoboa in length.

How it may have lived

All of this is presented in the text as assumptions by the researchers.

  • Hunting. The authors believe that the huge body and the particular structure of the vertebrae pointed to comparatively slow movement. The snake perhaps did not chase prey but waited for it, staying hidden until an animal came within striking distance. This is how, according to the text, modern anacondas and large pythons hunt, killing prey by squeezing it in their coils. Scientists suspect that Vasuki may have hunted in a similar way, but its exact food and way of hunting cannot be determined from the remaining bones.
  • Habitat. The structure indicates that the snake perhaps spent much of its time on land or in shallow water in swamps, rather than living only in water. The surroundings of the find site were then wetlands.
  • Why such a size. In the Middle Eocene a tropical climate with an average temperature of about 28 degrees Celsius prevailed in this area. Snakes are cold-blooded: they need external heat to regulate body temperature, and a warm environment can support the activity, digestion and growth of large reptiles. However, temperature alone does not determine how large a snake can become: food, a suitable habitat and evolutionary history also matter.

Which group it belonged to

Vasuki belonged to the extinct family Madtsoiidae, which existed for about 100 million years, from the Late Cretaceous to the Late Pleistocene, and lived in India, Africa, Europe, South America and Australia. This is a separate evolutionary line, not modern anacondas and pythons.

Its closest relatives, as the researchers found, were Madtsoia pisdurensis, a fossil snake from ancient India, and Gigantophis garstini, another large prehistoric snake known from North Africa. The authors believe that these links point to the origin of the line of giant madtsoiids on the Indian subcontinent with later spread. According to the text, when India moved north and about 50 million years ago collided with Asia, the change in geographic connections may have allowed these snakes to disperse across southern Eurasia, including southern Europe, and then, in the Eocene, from 56 to 34 million years ago, into Africa.

In another paper, published in the Journal of Paleontology, Datta and Bajpai described more fossil snakes from Eocene deposits in western India: aquatic snakes, another large madtsoiid and other extinct groups. Among the finds is an ancient aquatic snake species, Pterosphenus rannensis. From this the authors conclude that the giant predator was part of a broader community of snakes with different roles, rather than an isolated oddity of evolution.

What is a find and what is a conclusion

This is my arrangement, not words from the article.

  1. The find. 27 vertebrae, apparently of an adult snake, from the Eocene of India, some of them still connected, and their sizes.
  2. The calculation. A body length from 10.9 to 15.2 metres, obtained by two methods through comparison with modern snakes. This is an estimate from incomplete bones, and the authors themselves call it uncertain.
  3. Assumptions. A slow ambush snake that lived on land or in a swamp, killed prey with its coils, and the effect of a warm climate on size. These are the researchers' assumptions, and none of them has been directly measured.
  4. The hypothesis of dispersal. The line of giant snakes came out of India and spread to other places. This is a conclusion from kinship and geography, not an observation.

How to check this if you cannot open the scientific paper itself. In a retelling, look at each claim and see whether it says what the claim is based on: bones ("by comparison with the vertebrae of living snakes"), the authors' opinion ("believe", "suspect") or general considerations. If no basis is named, treat the claim as an assumption. The words "may", "perhaps" and "similar to" are also a signal that you are looking at an assumption, not a measurement.

Summary

Vasuki indicus was described from 27 vertebrae from an Indian mine, and its age is about 47 million years. Its length was estimated in the range from 10.9 to 15.2 metres, and the upper estimate is comparable to Titanoboa, but the authors themselves write of considerable uncertainty. The image of an ambush predator of the swamps and the link between size and a warm climate remain assumptions. The work itself came out in 2024, and ScienceDaily retold it on 14 October 2026.

See also another article in this section: Homo erectus in South Africa 2 million years ago.

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