Argentina: Scientists uncover bones of giant dinosaur in dry reservoir bed near Neuquen

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Bones from a gigantic herbivorous dinosaur have been uncovered at the bottom of a reservoir near the central Argentinian city of Neuquen, as seen in footage filmed on Friday.

Paleontologists lead by Jorge Orlando Calvo could be seen working to uncover the bones of the titanosaurian Futalognkosaurus at the Los Barreales reservoir.

“It is a long-necked herbivore called sauropods and more specifically titanosaurs, which are those that inhabited Patagonia and Gondwana millions of years ago. We are talking about rocks that are 90 million years old where it is now a desert and in the past it was a forest,” explained Calvo.

The dinosaur was discovered thanks to the low water level of the Los Barreales reservoir, and the first bones found were close to where a 30-metre-high Futalognkosaurus skeleton was extracted a few years ago, on land belonging to the Paynemil community.

Calvo, whose team is working against the clock as the fossils will be covered again by water when the reservoir level rises, said that exact analysis of the remains was pending that could reveal they belong to a Futalognkosaurus calf.

The Futalognkosaurus was a characteristic species of that area of ​​Neuquen in the late Cretaceous period. In 2000, a 70 percent complete skeleton was found, leading to the development of the renowned geopaleontological park Proyecto Dino of the National University of Comahue on Lake Barreales.

SOUNDBITES:

SOT, Jorge Orlando Calvo, Paleontologist (Spanish): “The remains of a large herbivorous dinosaur, among the pieces that we have found, arm bones, the humerus, tail vertebrae, many ribs, much of it is buried and what we are doing is rescuing everything we can because the lake now rises in summer and covers the excavation, and some pieces have been broken by that swell.”

SOT, Jorge Orlando Calvo, Paleontologist (Spanish): “It is a long-necked herbivore called sauropods and more specifically titanosaurs, which are those that inhabited Patagonia and Gondwana millions of years ago. We are talking about rocks that are 90 million years old where it is now a desert and in the past it was a forest”

SOT, Jorge Orlando Calvo, Paleontologist (Spanish): “More or less we calculated that it would have been about 23 to 30 metres long, based on the humerus that we have extracted, which is 1 metre 42 centimeters (4 feet 8 inches), the femurs would have reached two metres, but unfortunately we were late because we saw the silhouette on the rock and the waves broke it, we know it was a giant animal. And the vertebrae and the tail that we are taking at this moment are almost 50 centimetres long, which is indicating that the tail was 12 - 15 metres (39 feet - 49 feet) long.”

SOT, Jorge Orlando Calvo, Paleontologist (Spanish): “In this region about 800 metres (2,624 feet) away we have found another dinosaur in 2002 called Futalognkosaurus. That dinosaur is 80 percent complete, it is missing tail vertebrae, suppose they are buried, but here they are abundant. When we analyse the humeri, that are the arm bones that we have from dinosaurs, plus other pieces we can tell if it is a Futalognkosaurus, a long-necked herbivore and with that we would complete the puzzle that we are missing and it would be the largest and most complete sauropod herbivore in the world.”

#Neuquen #Argentina

Video ID: 20210925-025

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