Giant tortoise thought to be extinct more than 100 years ago found in Galapagos By Stephanie Weaver There was a very special celebration for a tortoise at a Pennsylvania zoo over the weekend. Ecuador - A team of scientists has found a giant tortoise from a species thought to have gone extinct more than 100 years ago, according to a press release issued Tuesday. After two years, a team from Ecuador's Ministry of the Environment and Water and the Galapagos Conservancy organization found an adult female giant tortoise on Fernandina Island, the third-largest island of the Galápagos Islands. A team of researchers at Yale University compared the DNA of the tortoise with another specimen extracted in 1906.