324-million-year old California fossil found stuffed in drawer changes everything we know about life on Earth

Talk about a prehistoric plot twist.A 324-million-year-old fossil that spent decades collecting dust in the basement of a California museum has turned out to be one of the earliest known insects on earth, rewriting the evolutionary history of life on Earth.For 40 years, the prehistoric creepy crawler — specimen No.28852 — sat tucked away in a drawer at the San Diego Natural History Museum, labeled Tesnusocaris goldichi — another run-of-the-mill ancient shrimp-like crustacean.

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By clicking above you agree to the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy.Never miss a story Turns out, scientists had it completely wrong.Thanks to an eagle-eyed Cambridge University PhD student who flew across the pond to inspect the forgotten slab, the museum has slapped a brand new label on the artifact: Chosha praecursor.

It’s not a crustacean.It’s an insect.The stunning reclassification officially crowns the prehistoric critter among the “earliest uncontested insects” ever discovered, the San Diego Union Tribune reported.

The discovery reportedly blew open the long mysterious “hexapod gap,” which is a 60 million year blackout in the fossil record during which early bugs seemingly vanished from Earth.The breakthrough came when Cambridge doctoral researcher Erik Tihelka spotted pictures of the long-overlooked fossil in a textbook and booked a ticket to SoCal to take a closer look himself, according to the San Diego Union Tribune.The creepy crawler had classic insect features, including six legs attached to its thorax, an egg-laying organ and a tail-like filament extending from its end, while also boasting numerous extra pairs of paddle-like legs jutting out from its abdomen — a crustacean feature.Scientists reportedly believe the creature may have used its extra paddle legs to glide through the water — offering a rare gli...