Volos Natural History Museum revival effort gathers scientists and researchers

A group of scientists and researchers is working to revive the Natural History Museum of Volos, which ceased operations in 2022. Founded in 2012, the museum previously displayed fossils, minerals and offered educational programmes for students and visitors.

The initiative, led by geologist Marco Vaxevanopoulos, seeks not only to reopen the museum in its former format but to expand it into a larger, modern centre that will serve as a cultural and scientific hub for Volos and the wider Thessaly region. Ongoing field missions across Greece have collected new specimens, including 200‑million‑year‑old ammonites from western Greece and mammal fossils such as elephants, giraffoids, tigers and bears from the Sesklo area, dating to about two million years ago.

One of the flagship exhibits the team hopes to return is the largest proboscidean tusk found in Thessaly, currently stored at the University of Athens' Department of Geology. The effort also highlights Greece’s lack of a national natural‑history museum despite its rich paleontological heritage.