An opportunity discovery of 4 monumental bones in a museum drawer has shone mild on a creature that swam within the seas that coated Oxfordshire 150 million years in the past.
The stays of the pliosaurus had been unearthed at Abingdon County Hall Museum by Professor David Martill.
The University of Portsmouth professor was wanting via a drawer of fossils when he came upon a big vertebra – and he was “thrilled” to seek out there have been three extra in storage.
Scans of the fossilised vertebrae revealed the marine reptile may have grown to 14.4m lengthy – twice the dimensions of a killer whale.
Professor Martill described the pliosaurs as “very fearsome animals”.
“They had a massive skull with huge protruding teeth like daggers – as big, if not bigger than a T-rex, and certainly more powerful.”
Pliosaurs had been like plesiosaurs, however with a much bigger elongated head, much like a crocodile, and a shorter neck.
They had 4 flippers, which acted as highly effective paddles to propel them via water and a comparatively brief tail.
Professor Martill obtained into palaeontological scorching water greater than 20 years in the past, when he advised on the BBC’s Walking with Dinosaurs sequence {that a} comparable particular, liopleurodon, may develop to 25m.
The agreed estimate was then revised all the way down to 6m.
“The size estimate on the BBC back in 1999 was overdone, but now we have some evidence that is much more reliable after a serendipitous discovery of four enormous vertebrae,” he mentioned.
“It wouldn’t surprise me if one day we find some clear evidence that this monstrous species was even bigger.”
The vertebrae had been initially found throughout non permanent excavations at Warren Farm within the River Thames Valley in Oxfordshire.
The research detailing the findings was printed in The Proceedings of the Geologists’ Association.
Source: information.sky.com”