Scientists in the U.K. have discovered a 32-foot “sea dragon” with a head that weighs more than one ton. Fortunately, it isn’t living anymore.
The ichthyosaur, which resembles a giant dolphin with arm and leg appendages, lived at least 180 million years ago in the Jurassic era, according to the Leicestershire and Rutland Wildlife Trust. Researchers are calling the “very well-preserved” fossil “the palaeontological discovery of a lifetime.”
Huge fossilised ‘sea dragon’ found in UK reservoir https://t.co/FWDdeAN3zF
— BBC News (World) (@BBCWorld) January 10, 2022
The creature was unearthed by Joe Davis, who says he’d initially thought he’d come across a set of pipes sticking out of the ground. However, as he got closer, he saw “what indisputably looked like a spine” with a jawbone at the spine’s end, he says. “We couldn’t quite believe it,” Davis says. “The find has been absolutely fascinating and a real career highlight. It’s great to learn so much from the discovery and to think that this amazing creature was once swimming in seas above us.”
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