Special Reports

Queensland and James Cook University Investigate Largest Dinosaur Footprint Found

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The world's largest dinosaur footprint has just been uncovered in Australia. It then led to the formation of a team of experts from Queensland University and James Cook University to investigate the remarkable discovery. Moreover, tracks of 21 different species were also unearthed in the same area.

Now dubbed as Australia's own "Jurassic Park", the exact location of the footprints is at Walmadany (James Price Point) on the Dampier Peninsula. BBC reported that the record holder measured 5'5" (1.75 meters) and belonged to a sauropod. The sauropod is the famous long-necked herbivore dinosaur featured in movies.

Apparently, the latest discovery has beaten the footprint found in Bolivia last year. It only measured 3'9" or 1.15 meters. The sauropod, for the record, lived about 140 million years ago.

The experts measured the tracks using a three-dimensional photogrammetry. It basically works by taking random photos from various angles to form an accurate model of the footprint. On the other hand, most of Australia's dinosaur fossils are dated between 115 and 90 million years old. Interestingly, the researchers have finally found the first evidence of the spiky-tailed stegosaurs too.

Dr. Steve Salisbury, a paleontologist at Queensland University, noted that the Australian "Jurassic Park" was the most diverse discovery on Earth. He said that to see 21 different types of dinosaurs all living together at the same time in the same area is truly one of a kind. Salisbury even compared it to the Serengeti, but one that happened during the Cretaceous period.

Per the Sydney Morning Herald, the tracks were almost lost in 2008 when the area was chosen to be the site of a liquid natural gas power plant. Luckily, the region's traditional native custodians, the Goolarabooloo people, contacted Dr. Salisbury and his colleagues to look at something they "knew was there." The expedition team has spent over 400 hours investigating and documenting the area.

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