Dinosaur fossil unearthed beneath Colorado museum's parking lot
As the team extracted a cylindrical rock core from 760 feet below the surface, they encountered a fossilised vertebra measuring about 2.5 inches in diameter. It turned out to be the oldest and deepest dinosaur fossil ever found within Denver's city limits, according to the museum's release, cited by CNN.
The partial vertebra is believed to belong to an herbivorous, bipedal dinosaur from the ornithopod group, a category of plant-eating dinosaurs that includes duck-billed hadrosaurs. Though scientists were unable to identify the exact species, the fossil dates back more than 67 million years, placing it in the Late Cretaceous period.
'We knew those dinosaurs were nearby in other parts of Colorado or Wyoming, but we didn't know that they were in Denver, too,' said Dr James Hagadorn, the museum's curator of geology, as per CNN reports. 'Now, we have another plant eater that's been cruising around Denver munching on, who knows, gingers and palm leaves and other ferns and plants 67 million years ago.'
The museum, which houses about 115,000 fossils in its collection, has now placed the ornithopod vertebra on public display. Hagadorn noted that there are only two other known instances worldwide of a dinosaur bone being found through a core sampling project, making this fossil likely the first of its kind ever showcased in a museum.
Despite the fossil's importance, the rest of the dinosaur's remains will remain underground. 'Unfortunately, we can't excavate our entire parking lot. Parking is really important at the museum and in all cultural centres,' Hagadorn joked according to CNN. 'But the bonus here is that people can now park right on top of a dinosaur.'
The drilling project initially aimed to explore alternative energy sources, not fossils. 'It's like the lucky strike,' Hagadorn told CNN.
The museum team has since used satellite and elevation data to date the new fossil and others in the Denver region more precisely. Their findings, published in Rocky Mountain Geology in June, offer a clearer picture of Denver's ancient inhabitants, which include not just ornithopods but also Tyrannosaurus rex, Triceratops, and Torosaurus.
'No one ever dated these things before,' said Hagadorn. 'Today, we were able to use some specialised maps, geologic maps, GIS and really precise elevations that you can now get from satellites to place all these things in space and then in time.'
(With inputs from CNN)
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