From the rock layer from which it was excavated, it was determined that the specimen was from the Early Cretaceous period (112 million years old).

The presence of large foramen in the turtle's skull where salt glands were is an interesting evolutionary point.

It is pointed out that this suggests that the evolutionary return to oceanic waters of the sea turtle line evolved before the finalization and streamlining of its paddles.

[1] Its genus, Santanachelys was named for the Santana Formation, the locality where the fossil was found and chelys, Greek for "turtle".

[4] After being part of the University of Zurich Department of Palaeontology for over 30 years and labeled simply as "Testudines indet.

Using CT scans, it was revealed that the bottom half of the specimen was a chimera created from parts of a Araripemys turtle fossil in combination with indeterminate fragments of shell.