Researchers have made a ginormous find. The bones of a long-ago dinosaur are the largest ever found of a land animal. News of the record-breaking beast came out even as excavations on it continue in Argentina.
Scientists found the remains in Neuquén, Argentina. The beast is a titanosaur, belonging to the sauropod family of dinosaurs. These animals were among the largest ever known to roam the Earth. Some were even nearly the size of today’s ocean-dwelling blue whales.
Titanosaurs featured stocky bodies, small heads, and extremely long necks and tails. Paleontologists have found these fossils on every continent except Antarctica. However, titanosaurs mostly inhabited South America, according to specialists from Conicet (National Council for Scientific and Technical Research of Argentina).
Until now, the largest known dinosaur was Patagotitan mayorum. This species also comes from the sauropod family. The previous record-holder may have stood 50 feet tall and weighed more than about a dozen Asian elephants!
The National University of Comahue (UNCo) reports that staff from the Argentinian energy company Pampa Energía had found fossil remains belonging to a herbivorous (plant-eating) dinosaur back in 2012. But the animal is so large that excavation is taking years.
“The fossil remains correspond to a herbivorous dinosaur. . . . These dinosaurs . . . have been recorded mainly in Africa and South America,” indicates the UNCo in a statement.
The January 10 report presented by the journal Cretaceous Research reveals “a giant titanosaur sauropod . . ., composed of an articulated sequence of 20 more anterior plus four posterior caudal vertebrae and several appendicular bones.” Whew. In other words, the giant fossil has tail bones and parts of hip bones.
For now, researchers aren’t revealing the full size of the new dinosaur. That’s because the humerus and femur—the longest leg bones—are still being excavated. Those bones help scientists determine height.
Paul Barrett, a paleobiologist at the Natural History Museum in London, told science news website Live Science, “Given the measurements of the new skeleton, it looks likely that this is a contender for one of the largest, if not the largest, sauropods that have ever been found.”
God made the beasts of the Earth according to their kinds. . . . And God saw that it was good. — Genesis 1:25
(Paleontologists sit for a photo during an excavation of the dinosaur fossil in southwest Argentina, on January 20, 2021. Jose Luis Carballido/CTyS-UNLaM)
