Formerly extinct bird species comes back from the dead

A previously extinct species of bird has made a miraculous return from the dead.

The white-throated rail previously inhabited the Aldabra Atoll in the Indian Ocean, but died off around 136,000 years ago after the island disappeared below the sea, reports CNN. But scientists have now found the bird has reappeared after sea levels declined several thousand years later, and it still inhabits the island today.

Scientists deem this phenomenon iterative evolution, per CNN, where a species repeatedly evolves from the same ancestor. This marks one of the "most significant" instances of it occurring in a bird species, reports CNN.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

In both instances, the rail colonized the island and evolved to be flightless due to a lack of competing predators.