PALM COAST, Fla. – Flagler County Sheriff Rick Staly said Wednesday a team of anthropologists are piecing together the skeletal fragments of who they believe is only one person after human remains were discovered at a Palm Coast construction site earlier this month.
“We have found fragments of jaw and fragments of the skull, and so far, indications are that it’s one person. We have found two femurs. If we find a third one, we have a problem,” Staly said of the excavation process, which began after a man at the construction site called 911 and said he found what he thought was a “human femur” on July 18.
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On Saturday, deputies concluded the excavation, saying additional excavation wasn’t necessary.
Staly also added its believed the human remains found were from the last few decades.
“At this point, we treat it as though it’s modern until we can say definitively that it’s not,” said Dr. Erin Kimmerle, who is leading the team of experts in the excavation.
Kimmerle and her team are known for conducting large-scale excavations, such as at the Dozier School for Boys in 2014 and at historical Black cemeteries across the state.
Staly, who previously said the recovery process was “painstakingly slow” as deputies needed to sift through “probably hundreds of yards of dirt,” paused the excavation last week until the USF anthropology team were able to come in and help Tuesday.
Kimmerle said her team of undergraduate and graduate students use machinery to speed up the recovery process.
“The soil is put on top of the sifting station. There’s two layers of mesh with different sizes so that the soil, the sand, is pushed through by the water and then bones, rocks, shells, anything else you see end up on the screen and we can look at it,” she said.
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