内容摘要：Ironworkers with the California High-Speed Rail Authority work on the Hanford Viaduct, Tuesday, April 15, 2025, in Kings County, Calif. (AP Photo/Godofredo A. Vásquez)

Ironworkers with the California High-Speed Rail Authority work on the Hanford Viaduct, Tuesday, April 15, 2025, in Kings County, Calif. (AP Photo/Godofredo A. Vásquez)

animal, dated to aroundThe discovery suggests that after the

emerged from the ocean around 400 million years ago, they evolved the ability to live exclusively on land much faster than previously assumed.“We had thought the transition from fin to limb took much longer,” said California State University paleontologist Stuart Sumida, who was not involved in the new research.Previously the earliest known reptile footprints, found in Canada, were dated to 318 million years ago.

AP correspondent Donna Warder reports on some really old fossil footprints.The ancient footprints from Australia were found on a slab of sandstone recovered near Melbourne and show reptile-like feet with long toes and hooked claws.

This image provided by Prof. Per Erik Ahlberg shows a slab of sandstone found near Melbourne, Australia preserving fossil footprints from a reptile-like animal that lived around 350 million years ago. The footprints are highlighted in yellow (front feet) and blue (back feet) and show the movements of three similar animals, researchers say. (Grzegorz Niedzwiedzki/Prof. Per Erik Ahlberg via AP)

This image provided by Prof. Per Erik Ahlberg shows a slab of sandstone found near Melbourne, Australia preserving fossil footprints from a reptile-like animal that lived around 350 million years ago. The footprints are highlighted in yellow (front feet) and blue (back feet) and show the movements of three similar animals, researchers say. (Grzegorz Niedzwiedzki/Prof. Per Erik Ahlberg via AP)It’s been more than a decade since a bear mauled two people in an alley late on Halloween night before a third person scared off the animal.

“It was the scariest thing that’s ever happened in my life,” said Erin Greene, who along with a 72-year-old man who tried to fight off the bear with a shovel survived their injuries. Greene, who had come to Churchill the year before for a job in the tourist trade, said it was the other animals of Churchill — the beluga whales that she sings to as she runs paddleboat tours and her dozen rescued retired sled dogs — that helped her recover from the trauma.There have been no attacks since then, but the town is watchful.

At Halloween, trick-or-treating occurs when bears are hungriest, and dozens of volunteers line the streets to keep trouble at bay. Any time of year, troublesome bears that wander into town too often may be put into the polar bear jail — a big Quonset hut-style structure with 28 concrete-and-steel cells — before being returned to the wild. The building doesn’t fill up, but it can get busy enough to be noisy from banging and growling inside, Van Nest said.Tourists stand outside the Polar Bear Holding Facility, Sunday, Aug. 4, 2024, in Churchill, Manitoba. (AP Photo/Joshua A. Bickel)