Nurse, sandbar and sand tiger sharks in the Virginia Aquarium & Marine Science Center’s Norfolk Canyon Aquarium are about to have some competition in size and reputation. Staff is making room in the changing exhibits gallery for a walk-through replica of the extinct Megalodon, which at 60 feet long, could figuratively be called the mother of all sharks. The exhibit Megalodon: Largest Shark that Ever Lived dispels myths, confirms facts, examines its culture, and inspires lessons for science and shark conservation today.

This national traveling exhibition, produced by the Florida Museum of Natural History, Gainesville, with support from the National Science Foundation, opens at the Virginia Aquarium November 10 and runs through February 19. It is free with Aquarium admission.

As unique as Megalodon was, so too is the exhibition that tells the story of this enormous creature. The exhibition showcases both fossil and modern shark specimens as well as full-scale models from several collections. Visitors enter a full-size sculpture of Megalodon through massive jaws and discover this shark’s history and the world it inhabited, including its size, structure, diet, lifespan, relatives, neighbors, evolution and extinction over 2 million years ago.​